Throwing Sparks
by igsygrace
Summary: Catching Fire from Peeta's POV. Dialogue from Catching Fire book used extensively. This is the sequel to Peeta's Games. I do not own any of the characters, which are the property of Suzanne Collins. Rated T for language and minor non-explicit sexual references in later chapters.
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter One**

* * *

There are no trees in Victor's Village

It's a tidy place. An ornate fence with an ornate gate, which opens on a perfectly square green lawn. Twelve houses - ornate but also tidy, solid blocks of houses built of gray stone - line three sides of the green, four to a side.

For the better part of twenty-five years, most of these houses have been empty and the Village has had a population of exactly one. Today, the population is tripling.

The Capitol let me choose which house to take. There's no particular difference among them, so I had few restrictions. Haymitch occupies one, Aster asked me not to take another. I settled on a corner house next door to Haymitch and furthest from the entry gates.

Katniss, it turns out, picked the house at the other end of the row, the house closest to the gates, so we're all occupying the same side of the square. Haymitch grumbled about it - how three people with an entire neighborhood to occupy would all choose to huddle together: he's used to his privacy.

Haymitch follows me up my porch - I am lightheaded with the fumes of alcohol wafting off of him - and I know he's watching me for unsteadiness: I'm still not entirely stable on stairs, and I'm carrying two big boxes. We get into the front room of the house, and I put the boxes down on the floor with a "woof."

"What's that racket?" Haymitch grumbles.

"My family is helping me move in," I say. But what we hear sounds mostly like a lot of people running around and an out-of-tune clatter of music.

We go through the kitchen to the living room. Sure enough, my four cousins occupy this room with their particular talent for seeming to be at least twice their actual number. The boys are playing tag around the fancy furniture. Ally - the one girl in the whole extended family - is sitting at a piano, plunking away at the keys with more gusto than accuracy.

"Hell, Peeta, a piano?" asks Haymitch, putting his hand through his hair.

"Rich people have pianos," says my mother, entering from a side room.

She claps her hands a few times and starts shouting out my cousins' names - from history, I know it will take a few rounds of this to get them all settled down - and I say, in an aside to Haymitch, "Don't worry, it won't ever be used."

He just watches, his eyes narrow, as the kids are eventually rounded up and sat down in a neat row on the sofa. This is the weird thing about my mom - she loves these kids just about as much as she hates their father - her brother. I think she's better with them than she was with us. When I was younger, I always struggled to understand this. I knew, vaguely, it had to do with the fact that they were motherless and their father a violent drunk. But I have come to understand that things are a little more complex than this. Other things come in to it - her resentment toward my father, for one; the beatings for another. Whereas the ones she doled out to us were shameful - to be ignored - or even to be excused away, her brother's abuse of his children elicits sympathy in her for the kids. She sees her own miserable childhood in theirs.

Twisted. But that, as I realize now, is how you live with trauma. I could dwell on my own all day and all night. Right after I came home from the Games, I spent forty-eight straight hours awake, with the only thing in my brain the image of a fire shining through a dark tangle of trees. I would give _anything_ to reverse what really happened, so I just hung my mind there - that last moment before I witnessed, close-up, the murder of a girl. Then I had to sleep - I had to sleep - and the nightmares came, inevitably. Dead girls, their faces swimming in the sky. Wolves encircling. The sound of a foot stamping the ground - right near my ear.

Every sleep since then, the dreams follow a familiar pattern. There is always some version of that sick transformation that the Games create in its participants. That moment - that moment - that moment of subtle change in the eyes, in the expressions - the subtle change in feelings. Sometimes I dream of Katniss, her eyes flickering down as I relive the exact second I realized that everything new and real in my life was as insubstantial as the plywood and dust that mimics grandeur in the Capitol. Sometimes I dream of the boy who tried to kill me, and I feel that spike of anger and rage again - that murderous feeling - while I raise my knife to him and watch his face turn into a mask of pure fear. But usually it's of that girl in the dark woods, her face frozen in its terrified expression and that moment - that moment - I felt her very last heartbeat with my own hands.

And then I will wake, sweating and whimpering, to find myself alone in a dark cave - and Katniss is missing, again, and I'm terrified, and there is blood on my hands. And I regret every selfish thing I have ever thought about the girl.

And then I wake for real and all my limbs are frozen in place. For a few terrible minutes I have to wait in mute anticipation for the pain that accompanies waking - the prickling in the blood as feeling comes back to me - my skin sizzling back to wakefulness - my arms and fingers, my legs and toes - even the phantom limb, the half leg I've been missing since the Games.

Those first weeks after the Games, that was the cycle I was in - insomnia, insomnia, nightmares. Still am, really. I just have come to accept the cycle, twisting the trauma so that it somehow fits in my own life. It means - avoiding people, holding no schedules. Curfew? I ignore it. If I need to slip out of my bedroom in the middle of the night and walk the streets of District 12 - I do it. I've been taking meals in my room, ignoring mail that comes to me from Effie Trinket. Absolutely everything I do now is to avoid sleep for as long as possible, in hopes that my eventual sleep will be too sound to contain dreams. My family must be glad that I'm finally moving out.

"Peeta … Peeta …."

I blink as Haymitch snaps his fingers in front of my face. This is also true. I tend to zone out sometimes - a lot, really. It's a good thing that, as a Victor, there is no need for me to actually do anything. I don't have to work. I don't have to go to school. There will be some obligations for the Capitol - I'll think about that later, I can't do it now - but otherwise, I'm just supposed to sit here, alone in my house in Victor's Village, a living embodiment of the glory of the Games and the primacy of the Capitol.

"What?" I ask him.

"I need to show you something," he says.

He all but drags me back into the kitchen and shows me the telephone and the telephone directory. Hardly anyone in District 12 even has a telephone, so most of the numbers in the directory belong to people in the Capitol. Something, something, something about limiting my phone calls to such-and-such.

"Also," says Haymitch, "now that she can phone you, Effie will be checking in on your talent development - and I think we can assume her calls will be regular and punctual."

"Sure."

"Look," he says, between gritted teeth, glancing back toward the living room, where my cousins' raucous noise is starting to rev up again. "Don't let her dictate what you do with your life and your winnings. She didn't have shit all to do with it."

I think of a rainy afternoon and my mother's exasperated cries - I can almost see myself hesitating in the kitchen - standing halfway between the chilly air of the open door and the boiling heat of the ovens - on the knife edge of the decision: my mother's anger or a girl's life. "I don't know about that," I tell him. "But don't worry about it."

I walk with him back outside and we stand on the porch for a moment. I glance north and I can see three houses down, toward Katniss'. It's still - she hasn't moved in, yet. But that should be later today.

Then - because I don't want to get caught lingering on her house, I pivot on my good foot to get a look at all of Victor's Village: my new home. Twelve houses. Set aside for victors of the Hunger Games. I was one of two last summer - normally, there is only one. And the victor usually comes from any of the other eleven districts. In all of the 74-year history of the Games, Katniss and I are only the third and fourth to have come from District 12. Twelve victor's houses seems overly-ambitious. Some Districts - 1 and 2 for instance - might have that many, I guess.

"Haymitch," I ask, abruptly, "how many living Victors are there, actually?"

"I don't know - fifty, sixty?"

"Don't you know?"

"What do you think - we have secret meetings? Support groups? I don't know."

Ally has started playing the piano again as I go back into the house. My mother is lingering over the boxes I brought in.

"Leave it," I tell her, a little more sharply than I intended.

She shrugs. "You sure you can get these upstairs OK?"

I self-consciously rub my left knee, feeling the brace where my natural leg meets the prosthetic attachment. "I thought I would use the spare room downstairs to sleep in. No reason not to, really."

She shakes her head. "Don't be ridiculous. I put all the - paints and whatever in there. The proper bedroom is the master bedroom upstairs."

I bite the inside of my mouth to keep from arguing with her. Whatever. "OK. Anyway, I want to unpack. You've … done enough. And it's only two boxes." Basically, everything I ever owned in the world - before the Games.

"You're going to have to have a - housewarming, you know."

Hmm. That sounds dreadful. And housewarmings are normally for weddings. When you are assigned a house, it is because you are getting married and moving out of your childhood home. A happier occasion. "Hmm," I say.

She shakes her head. "Dana was hinting around - that - you could help out with …."

Now, anger spikes. As it always eventually does with her. But it's only since the Games that I haven't been able to clamp down on it, suppress it. "What the hell? Uncle Dana isn't getting anything from me. You know what? The kids - the kids I'll take care of. They can all four of them move in with me, but he doesn't get shit." I stare at her. She suddenly looks a lot older to me - a lot smaller, too, and more frail. I feel a rush of a really dark, guilty joy that I am leaving her house, her orbit, her - control. "In fact, you can tell Uncle Dana from me - I have nothing better to do - I might just go to school every once in a while and check in on the teachers who have always cornered me about their bruises … if he doesn't cut his shit out, I'll do better than give him the beating he deserves. I'll go straight to the Peacekeepers. Straight to the Capitol. Why are you pleading his case, anyway?"

Her face is tight and pink after this outburst, and I can see - I can feel - her resentment of me. "You're not doing much. I hear the Everdeens are moving in to Katniss' nice new house."

Oh - to hell with this. "So? Anyway - I think they all actually like each other."

"You always were ungrateful."

I laugh at that. Then I frown. "Can you get Ally to play something else - any damn other thing?"

"What - not in the mood for the valley song?" she asks, with an edge in her voice.

As a matter of fact - I'm not. "How can you even tell that's what it is?" I suck in my breath. "Look - thanks for your help. I'll take your housewarming idea under advisement. But I do - I really do need to be alone right now."

When night falls, I struggle for awhile with the coal stove that warms the house, then - hot and sweaty - I go outside to cool off on the porch. The darkness here is so eerie. Where I grew up - above the bakery in the dead center of town - there was nearly always light and activity. Here, there is a soft glow to one side - the direction of Haymitch and Katniss' houses - but otherwise, we are wrapped in the night. I'm at the rear of Victor's Village, and the village itself is on the south border of District 12 - the fence is no more than a mile away - and there is nothing in that direction. Not a soul.

And there are no trees. No friendly cover. No dark and twisted shadows in the night. No place to hide. No place for the creatures to hide. The glow of the fire in the night, as I walk toward it - the beacon of the innocent. The gnarled branches framing a murder -.

I start at the sound of a closing door and look around to see Haymitch come out onto his porch and nod at me. He walks over and climbs up to me, making himself at home on the porch swing my mother made sure to order for me. He carries his flask - he would hardly look whole without it - and takes a swig before saying a word.

"Quiet now - thank god," he says. "Drink?"

I give a mirthless laugh. "No, thanks."

He sighs. "Nothing like a passed-out sleep and large chunks of memory lost to booze - to help deal with … things."

Well. This is a temptation, no lie. But I shake my head. "Haymitch - no offence. Currently, it's rather high up on my list to avoid turning into you."

His turn to laugh. "I remember that feeling," he says.

I look at him and try to discern his expression in the darkness. So much - there is so much still mysterious about this man who helped to save my life in the Games. Not just mine - but Katniss', as well. I don't know if he predicted just how successful his strategy would be - I still don't know for certain who he actually chose to win, Katniss or me. I provided the groundwork - a decision to lay down my own chance at winning for the possibility of ensuring hers. But his was a more subtle plan, teasing a love story out of our alliance. So - when she and I met again in the arena of the Games, all we had to do was pretend to fall in love, right there, right in front of everyone's eyes - and suddenly, for Panem, one Victor was not enough. So - I lived.

There were complications. Multiple games were being played at once, and when the Gamemakers rescinded the offer to allow for two victors - at the very end of the Game - Katniss had to outsmart them, one last time. She would not let them have one - it was both of us or neither. A gamble - so big of a gamble because I would have absolutely let her take the victory. But she won that round. And for that I am alive - and should be grateful.

The other complication - minor in the big picture, but hard for me to get over - I really did fall in love with her. I was more than a little in love with her to start out with. And I truly did believe she had fallen for me. So, at the moment that I needed that bit of happiness to cling to - the moment - I realized that I had been fooling myself, and she had been fooling me. It's been enormously difficult to get over that. It's been about a month, now, since we came home from the Capitol, holding hands for the crowds as they feted us with an enormous party. I walked her home after - and that was the very last of our interaction. Since then - it's just been sleep and nightmares I've been wrestling with, anyway. Would it be better to have her with me through this? Maybe it wouldn't make a difference.

But I doubt that.

And here's Haymitch. Who has been completely alone for as long as I've known him. No family. No friends. Nothing but booze. It's an ominous warning.

"You could go over," he says abruptly. "Welcome her to the neighborhood. It's a perfectly reasonable thing to do."

I rub my eyes. The very concept of my own sleepiness makes me panic. Of all things I want to do on this first night in my new home - sleep is not one of them. "I'm not in a reasonable mood, Haymitch," I say. "Yet."

So, I go back into the house and walk around the lower floor for awhile. My boxes of clothes still sit in the front room. The coal fire has already sputtered out. I finally - sometime very late that night - find myself in the spare room - or the "study" as my mother insisted on calling it. I will not be working nor going back to school, but I do have to do something for the Capitol to prove that I am still a functioning member of society. Talent development, they call it. That decision was easy for me. I want to learn how to paint.

My mother set up the easel and one of the canvases. Tubes of paints are on the floor, boxes of brushes. For now, I think, pulling out the supplies and laying them out in front of me - for now, it would be enough to swirl colors on the blank canvas, just to get the feel of it. With any luck, this will keep my head occupied and sleep at bay.

And it does.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

* * *

The first snow falls early, heralding a rough winter ahead. It's only just November when it falls - like most early snowfall, it's a dusting, really; fine flakes like ashes falling in a light, swirling descending pattern.

The big houses do not hold heat efficiently - or maybe I'm just doing it wrong, I don't know. I've got the stove working, fairly consistently, but the upstairs is cold every morning. It's a struggle to get myself out of bed and into the chilly air. Most mornings - that's no big deal. But I've actually made an appointment for today. I gather my quilt around me and hobble downstairs. I'll bathe on the ground floor.

By seven, I'm bundled up in a brand new coat, gloves and boots and make my way carefully down the slick steps of the porch - to be on the safe side, I clutch the railing. I still never know when the left leg is going to decide to take a wide angle on stairs. The knack of placing the thing - the nerveless footstep and the squeezing sensation that my knee still doesn't know how to interpret - has not yet come to me. There are things I'm supposed to be practicing, in order to get better at this. I just don't want to. I get around OK.

I walk past Haymitch's house, the empty house next door and, finally Katniss' house - then pause at the gate when I hear a door open and close behind me. From Katniss' house, Primrose Everdeen emerges, all bundled up herself in new winter clothes.

"Heya, Peeta!" she calls over to me. I can hear the surprise in her voice.

I wait for her to catch up to me, then I ask, "Heading to school?"

"Yes. You're up early this morning."

I shrug.

Prim is twelve - or maybe thirteen now. Four months ago, when her name was called at the Reaping, she was a tiny thing. Underfed, for one, despite all the effort her sister put into it. But also - just a small girl, prepubescent - a tiny, yellow-haired girl who could have been ten years old, at the time. But she's hit her stride. I think she must have six more inches on her since then - I very well could be underestimating - and she's just the slightest bit stouter. Now she looks as well-fed and cared for as any Townie girl - she is completely indistinguishable from the girls I grew up with. I wonder what it was like for her - going back to school this fall after the drama of last summer - finding herself suddenly well-off, after twelve years of near-starvation, and her sister famous. Of course, around District 12, we all knew each other, anyway - and Katniss was already something of a celebrity.

Our paths lie together until we reach town, but we don't speak until it is time to part - I head straight in and she bears east, toward the school. I give her a "bye" and she a more fulsome "see you around, Peeta." She's a friendly girl - always has been.

I head to the bakery, approaching it from the storefront, which is right on the town square, instead of going around the back like I always used to do. I check out the cakes in the window - they're OK, but could be better - then enter the store, setting off the little bells.

My father comes in from around the back, wiping his hands on his apron so that flour dust is flying around him in a cloud. "Thought you'd changed your mind," he says.

I stare at him. Like my mother, he suddenly looks older to me than he did last spring. His pale hair is a little thinner, I guess - the lines on his face a little more pronounced. He's of average height, a little stout - muscular in his youth, he's now just losing ground to gravity. He's always been very quiet, very gentle - but that doesn't mean that I haven't been nearly as resentful of him as I have my mother. There's a list of things in my head - both reasonable and unreasonable, and everything in between. From his quiet capitulation to my mother's temper, to his overall collusion with the rest of Panem in allowing the Games to continue. What could he do about it? I don't know. But he let me go - to my death. Not one peep in protest. Just some tears and hugs at the parting. I shouldn't be back home - alive - to resent it. But, unfortunately, I am. "Not used to getting up this early," I say, coolly.

"I'm glad that you decided to bake at home - it's good to have a useful hobby. But your mother will be down at any time."

I roll my eyes. "So, I'm not supposed to even be here, now? Because I won't give handouts to the brother she has said - all my life - would be better off dead?"

"She says you threatened him."

I look down at my hands. That makes it sounds so … that makes it sound …. "I guess so, if you want to put it that way. Like I would _actually_ turn anyone in to the Capitol … regardless, you all may have convinced yourself it's fine for people to hit their own kids, but -."

"Shhh!" He glances nervously back toward the kitchen. "I'm not saying that you're wrong, Peeta. But - I will say it doesn't sound like you."

I laugh. I don't care if she hears me. I'd rather like her to, in fact. "Who do you think I am? I'm sixteen years old - there was no _me_ , yet, before I went to the Games. How can you not get that?"

He shakes his head. "It's just so hard - to understand."

"Well - whatever I am, you can at least all let yourselves off the hook. Whatever I am is not what I was going to be. I'm the Capitol's, now."

"Peeta -." He interrupts me as I've turned to give a grand, self-righteous exit. And I don't care - I just don't care. I'm too tired to feel anything. Even the anger that spikes, here and there, lasts only long enough for one outburst before suffocating in the general blankness. It is cold, not hot - it numbs me, inside and out. "We miss you."

I close my eyes. This means _nothing_.

In the end, I accept the flour and sugar from him and carry them back to my house, two large sacks over my shoulders. I may have lost a substantial amount of weight and muscle-tone during the Games, but my shoulders can still bear large burdens, pretty well. It's my fucking false foot that is the trouble - I have to watch every step on the slippery ground, and it makes me hobble, slowly, like an old man - through the town square and the surrounding streets, down through the open fields and back to Victor's Village.

As I approach the gates, I hear the crunching sound of footsteps behind me in the snow, and I pause to let whoever it is - hopefully Haymitch, _please god_ let it be Haymitch - pass me.

On the surface, she is unchanged. As a matter of fact, it might be exactly one year ago and I'm watching out the kitchen window as she comes up to the bakery to trade with my father. Her frayed jeans and the cracked old leather jacket - boy, that brings up memories - her long, dark hair in its single braid. The worn leather boots. The game bag flung over her shoulder.

It's the subtle differences. All the things that I noticed separately before - the glimmer in her gray eyes, the lift to her chin - that have coalesced into a painfully attractive whole. And the sadness to her - the exhaustion. There are dark circles under her eyes, indicating she, too, suffers from a lack of sleep - and also there is an expression on her face when she looks at me - frustration, exasperation. Not a dozen words have passed between us since we both moved into Victor's Village. It's just easier to avoid her than to figure out what on earth to say.

"Hey," she says, looking down at the ground after, very briefly, meeting my eyes. She's always been a girl of few words. And I never ever even spoke to her before we got on the train to the Capitol. For the purposes of conversation there is virtually nothing to draw on besides the Games.

"Go ahead," I grunt.

Am I waiting for her to eventually get the dialogue going? After all, I was the one with the last question: how much is left, here at home, of the relationship that flourished in the arena? If so, I'm disappointed, again. She nods her head and passes me, on light feet, and heads up to her house.

She's still hunting - I knew this, already. I've been the beneficiary of some of this - it's not like she needs to do it, anymore, so I'll get some of the excess (generally via Haymitch or Prim delivering a squirrel or a hunk of venison). Two possible reasons. One - she wants to. It's her way of filling up the days that she would otherwise spend, like me, with nothing to do. Two - and far more likely - she goes to spend time with Gale Hawthorne, who has been her hunting partner and friend (and probably more) for years. He has graduated from school now, and works in the coal mines - but miners live on near-starvation wages, and I'm sure he's still hunting to feed his family and supplement his income.

None of my business. I mean - on a purely objective note, it's technically quite a risk to take. Leaving the District to go out to the woods is illegal. To be caught with weapons probably would mean capital punishment. If it was just about the income … but I know it is not. It's about who she is, and about Gale and about all the complicated things you try to cling to when your identity has been violently disrupted.

I know this.

I put the ingredients in the kitchen, but any taste for baking has left me. The morning has been exhausting, already. I could go back to bed, bury myself in blankets and wait for the dreams to come. But I force myself into the study, breathe in the delicious chemical smell of the paints and turpentine. I've got five canvasses going, with paintings in various stages of completion. Portia - the one person from the Capitol I really trust - sent me some of her old textbooks on painting and drawing and these have been useful when I've run into issues with mixing colors and creating texture. The rest comes naturally. From swirls of chaotic colors have come, eventually, shapes and figures. The first painting - the framing bones of trees in the darkness surrounding the central burst of light - is nearly done. And a very strange thing has happened as it has neared completion - the dream itself, of approaching the fire in the woods, where I will see the wounded girl, where I will sit with her until she dies; the dream itself has started to recede. It is no longer the most frequent of my dreams; and when it comes it does not hold the same terror. I guess I have put it, successfully at last, somewhere outside my brain, and this has lessened its power.

Time can slip by so quickly when I paint, so, when the doorbell rings, I am surprised to find that the day has wheeled away and I am standing in a dim room, clutching a paintbrush in front of one of the canvasses. My hands and clothes are covered in smears of paints in a variety of shades of brown and I stare at the picture. Opposing sensations - I have captured her murderous expression; she glances down at me from her perch in the tree, and her eyes are filled with the disgust at my betrayal. I almost feel actual shame at her look. On the other hand … this is it, I've actually done it. The angle is perfect, she herself is so realistic.

The bell rings again and I shuffle wearily through the house to answer it. It's my father … I lean against the door jamb, just completely exhausted. I have no energy for him.

"Come in," I say. "Er - I'm a bit of a mess."

He walks in and we stand in the front room, just staring at each other for a moment. Then, I gesture for him to sit. I am almost asleep on my feet.

"I wanted to say - I'm sorry," he says, quickly and quietly. "When I say I don't understand … I guess, I mean that I should try. You are - clearly - suffering."

Part of me wants - and wants badly - to respond in kind. But it's so embarrassing; I don't know what to say. Maybe it's too late to have this kind of relationship with him. Unless ... "There's been something - I needed - to apologize to you for," I say, haltingly. "In the arena … when I talked about you and - about you and Mrs. Everdeen. I know that must have been …."

He looks at me disbelievingly. "That's a really small …."

"It's just that," I press on. I feel the need to explain myself. "It's just that - Haymitch said, make everything as personal as possible, as honest, and the people will respond."

I look at him for a reaction and he just - looks - at me. I can see in his face that he has no idea how to respond.

"And I needed her to understand - that she could trust me, that I was telling the truth. If I had made something up …."

"It doesn't matter, son. It really doesn't."

"But it does," I insist. "You say you want to understand, so _try_ to understand. In the very smallest of ways, as well as the large ones, they make you hurt other people in order to preserve your own life. And that - I mean, you have to kill a part of yourself to make that happen. Even if you didn't do it for yourself. Even then."

He nods. "I see. I think I see. I can't do anything about that, now. All I can do is … you can't live like this - bitter and alone and - and - without purpose."

"I think I can, actually."

"Peeta - I was hoping that you would see your way to - helping out at the bakery again."

I squint at him. "It's not allowed. Anyway - I'm not really up to schedules. Or - to be honest - spending a lot of time with mom."

"I know - I know. I thought maybe if you could just come over, once a week, to frost the cakes. Just a little thing. But it would be helpful to us. None of the rest of us can do it as well as you can, and the window display helps business."

"Dad, I -." But I stop the refusal that is on my tongue. Why not? Why automatically reject the idea? Somewhere, beyond the haze of my sleep-deprived consciousness, I know that it's a good one. Good for me. "I'll think about it," I tell him.

After he leaves, I go back to the study, but inspiration has seeped away. There's sleep, I think - there's sleep. But I can't bring myself to mount the stairs. Instead, I shrug a jacket over my paint-stained clothes and go outside to walk myself into even further levels of exhaustion.

Haymitch's lights are all on. I wonder if he's sober enough to talk tonight. I could ask him, in general, if the Capitol would frown upon my doing some part-time cake frosting. As I knock on his door, I wonder why I'm suddenly so anxious for company. Prim, Katniss, my dad - this is more human interaction than I usually have on a regular day, as it is.

When I get no answer, I carefully open the door and let myself in, bracing myself against the reek of the place I know is coming - a smell that combines all possible flavors of waste - mildew and rot, urine and vomit, old food and dirty clothes. Let alone the fumes of white liquor.

The inside of Haymitch's house shows the twenty-five years of neglect he's put into the place since he won his Hunger Games. It's dusty and dirty, and piles abound - filthy laundry, old bottles, generic refuse. It's a wonder he hasn't died of some infection or food poisoning. It might be just for his annual trek to the Capitol, as a mentor in the Games, that he takes regular showers. Drunk … broken … a man who has almost completely given up. Yet - I feel a closeness to him, bordering on affection, that I don't feel for my own father. Whatever I was meant to be, this is what I am now: a dysfunctional member of the dysfunctional family of Victors.

He's passed out at his table, the remnants of a bottle dripping slowly off the side. It's cold - he's let the fire die out. Reckless. But I understand.

I drag him over to the living room and lie him on his couch, covering him with the least-odoriferous blanket I can find. Then I stoke the coals in his fire and sit there with him, letting the wet, uneven snores remind me that I'm not completely alone.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

* * *

 _Down in the valley_

 _The valley so low_

 _Hang your head over_

 _Hear the wind blow_

Over the singing, I barely hear the sound of the doorbell. It's probably Haymitch, coming to complain about the noise. I leave the cacophony behind a little gratefully - it's amazing how discordant they are, and how grating a ruckus can be when you are used to near-absolute quiet.

I never did have a housewarming, but I offered the house for Solstice dinner - for once, at least, we all wouldn't be crowded. Dad and Mom, Ryan and Will, Grandma Mellark, Uncle Dana and the four kids: Ally, Isoc, Pauly and Rush. I spent days dreading this gathering - manically painting and baking - and I'm just happy that it's almost over and I can relax again. At least, everyone is on good behavior. Dinner is over, the kids are singing songs; shortly, Dana will start to fret - we don't serve liquor - and he'll insist on going. Once he leaves, everyone else will, too. Almost over.

I'm surprised to see Prim at the door, smiling, but stamping her feet a little against the cold. "Hey, Peeta," she says.

"Hi! Hey - um - come in?"

I close the door on the latest winter storm - I really can't remember what it feels like to be warm - as she steps inside the front room. I see she's got a parcel. It's a familiar shape.

"Rabbit?"

"Yes."

"Late in the year," I say, my mouth watering as I relieve her of it.

"You have guests," she says, as the singing rises in the other room.

"Just family. And I have something for you. Come with me into the kitchen - sorry for the mess, by the way."

She follows me into the kitchen, which is indeed a mess of bowls, pans and utensils. I put the rabbit in the ice chest, then find a cloth bag in which to pack some of the remaining cookies of the day - they are in floral shapes, brightly colored in orange, pink and yellow. Something spring-like to brighten the gloom of the shortest day of the year.

"Thanks!" she says.

"Come say hello to everyone," I say, with more politeness than enthusiasm. Not that they don't all know her, of course. And she knows my family - she always used to stop by the bakery, back before the Games, and look at the displays. And - furtively - my father would sometimes give her a couple of cookies when she left. He always liked her. Well, she looks like her mom.

The room quiets as she enters behind me, and nervous hellos are exchanged. Then I walk her back to the front door.

"Is this - one of your paintings?" she asks, stopping by an easel that was set up in the front room.

I turn to her hastily, a little worried - it is the arena that comes out of my paint brushes. Some paintings are benign - a boulder next to a creek, the dripping wall of a cave - but many include monsters and, more than a few, her sister.

"Oh, yes," I say, squinting at it. That's right - I wanted to see how the blue showed up in the morning light, and my front room windows look east. It's a wolf mutt, golden-furred, snarling out of the canvas. Well - what are you going to do?

"Looks like you're about ready for the Tour."

I shrug. I've been trying not to think about the Tour - an impossibility, with Effie Trinket calling twice a week for updates. The winner - in this case winners - of the most recent Hunger Games are obligated to participate in a Victory Tour midway in the year between the Games. As part of this Tour - an exhausting two-week visit of the other eleven districts, culminating in a party in the Capitol and a festival in the home district - the Victor has to show off his or her talent development progress. So, some of the paintings will be coming with me.

So, too, will Katniss, of course, and Haymitch. So - there will be an uncomfortable reminder of the Games, built right in. Not to mention, the current awkwardness between me and Katniss - an awkwardness that will be a surprise for the audiences of Panem, who last saw us snuggled up against each other in our final interview with Caesar Flickerman. And on top of that, going back there - to the Capitol - I'm not sure my head can handle it.

"It's amazing," she continues. "So lifelike."

Better lifelike there on canvas instead of snarling in my dreams. Not that Prim is to know. "Thanks. And - thanks for stopping by. Please thank Katniss for - for the rabbit."

"No problem. You take care, Peeta."

As she leaves, I find myself staring blankly out into the darkness, out over the green of the Village, oblivious to the cold. Then, something breaks my concentration. I grab my jacket and head outside into the snow. Yeah … that's what I thought. I follow footprints in the snow across the green, to the row of empty houses on the other side. The house on the east corner - what did Aster say about it before? Something about neither front nor back door, but a window that is unlocked on one side ….

"Peeta Mellark!"

I'm greeted with cries of surprise by the group of people with whom I used to be about as close as any people in the world. In the glow of their flashlights, I see not just Aster but Delly, Lily, Sammy and Quill. There are a few others - friends of Aster's, probably - who I know only in passing.

They are sitting in a circle in the living room. Two big jars - most likely of moonshine, which Aster has always seemed to have in ready supply - are passed around the circle. Aster scoots over and makes a space for me.

"Some of you all need to be a bit more covert," I tell them. "Your footprints are all over the snow."

"Damn it, people," says Aster. "Get with it or get uninvited."

I laugh - she's slurred her words, already a little drunk. But I find the warmth of the bodies pressed together - pressed against me - a pleasant sensation, and find I can't resent any of them. They all look so much the same as they did before - Aster, the rich girl, with sleek golden hair and a curvy frame. Delly - my oldest friend, the cheerful little girl who grew up next door to me, round and jolly, with her hair in ringlets. Sammy - ash blonde, lean and wiry. Lily - plain but vaguely pleasant, Delly's best friend.

And their lives are all so much the same. They talk about school - the brutality of the latest exams. Sammy answers my questions about the wrestling team - he's the team captain this year, a position I was hoping for for myself. Aster asks me about what I've ordered from the Capitol - now I have money. Fancy shower heads, rapid cookers, china dishes? I laughingly protest - saying I stopped my mom from spending my money on such pointless stuff.

When the moonshine comes around, I go ahead and take a small sip. It burns the skin inside my mouth right off - at least, that's what it feels like - and I cough hoarsely. Aster thumps my back, which makes me cough even harder, and everyone laughs. Somehow - Victor or no - I've reverted back to my place with these people, and with no effort: the naive kid who is always the last to try anything new.

The second swallow goes down easier, and burns a pleasant warm trail down my chest on the way down. Quill starts telling dirty jokes - he's a natural performer. I think I might laugh - for fun - for the first time in months. And I'm not forgetting anything - everything is still there, the arena, the Tour, the nightmares, the loneliness - but the booze is replacing all sadness with a light and giddy feeling - a relaxation of my muscles, of my spirit, of my soul. It's _good_ to feel the girl's leg pressed against mine - even as she flirts and kisses with some kid on the other side of her. It feels like my body and all my nerves are alive for a change.

It's _good_ to talk to Sammy. No one asks me for an explanation as to what I have been doing these last couple of months - why I have been holding myself apart. They don't care - they live, day to day, with or without me. Untroubled by the future, as we always were before. No point to thinking about next year's Reaping, because the Reaping is as regular as the seasons. Midsummer comes and the Reaping comes and goes. Odds are long that they'll be picked, so - why worry about it? They'll be out of it in two years. In the meanwhile, there is fun to be had.

I won't be out of it, of course. I'll be a mentor, now, in the Games, taking over for Haymitch as the mentor of the District 12 boys. From now until someone else actually wins, I guess. Which could be forever. Or could be one of these guys - there's no knowing. …

I take a third drink, a much longer swallow. I make a face across the circle at Delly - like we used to, back when we were five - and she returns the look with a laugh. There's a little bit of desperation now - the booze not quite holding off my bloody imaginings. If I could be reaped, so could she, Sammy, Aster … any of them, really. How would I do it? How would I prepare them to meet their deaths?

Aster turns away from her boyfriend to whisper something to me - I can't hear what she says, but she puts her fingers on my left thigh and drums them while she talks. I swallow - this feels forward, aggressive - but it could also be accidental, and it certainly is a little drunken. And yet - part of me resents the necessity to grasp her hand and move it off of me.

"So faithful," she murmurs, "as always."

Yeah, well. Not that I can say anything - it's ridiculous. Everyone knows Katniss still goes into the woods with Gale, and they've all long suspected it's not entirely innocent. It's not faithfulness, really. It's me being damaged and confused and still just sober enough to remember it.

Once that hurdle is over, the group continues as I guess they always do in these get-togethers. Aster and her boyfriend disappear for awhile, Delly and Sammy lock lips and make disgusting slurping noises. Lily and I and a couple of other people play dice and just keep on drinking until, one by one, we've passed out.

* * *

Shit.

I'm the first awake the next morning. My head pounds as I sit abruptly up, the gray light, dim as it is, hurting my eyes. _Shit_. I completely forgot that I left my entire family in my house - my little cousins expecting to spend the night. Everyone probably wondering where the fuck I went to.

I look around me, at the center of a pile of teenagers huddled together in puffy jackets. I wonder what they told their parents last night - if any of them were expected home. The hue and cry could be coming at any moment. And I -.

I clutch my head as something gives a terrific squeeze and I start to retch. I run for the window, slide it open and start puking into the snow.

Once my stomach has stopped its spastic heaving, I slither out of the window and push snow over the steaming pile of puke. My hands start trembling as memories flash - the fainting fit by the creek, getting sick next to the dead girl. I find myself racing - as fast as I can in the snow with my uncertain feet - to Haymitch's house.

Haymitch is peeved to be woken up early in the morning, but once he sees my green face, his amusement at my predicament brightens his eyes a little. He gives me some foul-tasting drink - it takes like yeast and liquid liver - as well as some coffee, saying, "One more puke and you should feel a lot better."

He's right - at least my stomach feels better - but the headache and the slick, sweaty nasty feeling of my skin is every bit the same. Nothing for that, he warns me, but to sleep it off. "You'll get over that part after a while. Takes some practice."

I shake my head. "Never again. _Never_." I look at him - I'm hunched pathetically in a blanket on his sofa and I know for once he looks a lot more put together than I do. "You were right - there was a numbness over everything, for a little while. But it's not worth it. There has to be a better way."

He hmmphs. "Well, let me know if you find it."

"Did - did anyone come looking for me last night?"

"Yes. Your father stopped by, asking if I saw you. They seemed to think you went over to the Everdeens. Then I guess they stopped by the Everdeens to ask, because Katniss came by later, also asking if I saw you."

I feel my face go hot.

"Don't worry," Haymitch continues. "I told her you go for long walks at night. I didn't tell anyone where you actually were."

"How did _you_ know?"

"I figured you must know those kids who think they are so good at sneaking into empty houses. There's no subtlety to you Townies. Comes from a life living without the proper fear of things."

"Yeah," I say, vaguely apologetic. Then - "Is that why you wouldn't tell me about all that stuff at the end of the Games - the Capitol being mad about the berries and Katniss needing to ratchet up on the romance stuff? Because - you thought I would give it away?"

He squints at me. "Peeta," he says, slowly. "How do I put this? There are ears everywhere. It doesn't get better if you're a Victor. It gets worse. Opportunities for conversations are limited. You should remember this, when you hang out with your friends. It won't do them any good to be friends with a Victor if people decide to - crack down."

I sink gloomily into his sofa. So - is he saying that his house is bugged? And maybe mine? And that if I hang out with my friends - my family - that they will come under the scrutiny of the Capitol, as well? Is this why he is so completely alone? Our problems, I realize, are much larger than my personal inability to cope.

"Haymitch," I say, "I gotta find a way out of my head."

The look he gives me is unreadable. If it's pity - I don't recognize it. It's a crunchy, uncomfortable expression. "I don't think I have your answers, boy."


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four**

* * *

I gasp awake into darkness and a familiar panic settles on me. The cave is exact in the reproduction - the wrinkled texture of the granite walls, the uneven ceiling, the smooth, cold floor. I sit up and I see that I am alone in the darkness. I lift up my hands and see they are covered in blood, swirled around like finger paints.

"Katniss!" My hiss echoes in my ears. "Katniss! Katniss!"

She's gone again. And sorrow presses down on my chest. It tightens around my throat, until I can no longer speak, not even to call out for her. She's gone.

I blink awake, my heart pounding hard over those seconds before I realize that I am no longer in a dream. Then I wait, resigned, for the paralysis to burn away with the prickly sensation like a million small needles poking my skin. Finally, when my mind settles back into my tingling body, I sigh and rub the sweat away from my face.

When I get up, it's actually cold, stone cold. It's late January, now, the third straight month of winter storms. The house around me seems ghost-like in the darkness and my breath makes a visible cloud around my face. After a moment of confusion, I realize I fell asleep in the living room, lying, knees slightly bent, on a couch that is a little too short for me. I swing myself off the sofa and realize I'm clutching a paintbrush, hard, in my fist. I set it down on a side table and head over to the fireplace - stiffly. I'm pretty well accustomed to the artificial leg, now, but there's always a bit of stiffness when I've fallen asleep with it on. The cold doesn't help, either.

The fire in the coal-burning insert has died down to ashes. I pull it open - as always, struck by the memory of the ovens at the bakery - and put in some more coal, stoking it until the sparks coalesce back into flame. It should have lasted the night, but sometimes I get wrapped up in my work, and I must have forgot to restock the coal before lying down on the sofa, contemplating my current painting. Sometimes I still forget that it's just me to do all the chores.

As the fire sparks to life, it illuminates the half-circle of easels in the room. I usually don't paint in here. There is better light in the either the study, which is south-facing, or the front room, with its big windows looking east. But I'm required to bring some of my paintings on my trip, so I set them all up in the largest room of my house, picking the ones I want to bring, touching these up. The whole process has filled me with a weird kind of anxiety. I'm just demonstrating my commitment to keep busy, per the Capitol's instructions. But I'm also rather proud of them, especially since I'm almost entirely self-taught.

This morning … wait, is it? I wonder, and squint at the clock on the mantelpiece. Yes, it's four in the morning ...This morning's nightmares are not a surprise, really. Today, at last, brings the Victory Tour and everything about it that I have been dreading.

Since it's early enough, I start on some bread. As with Katniss and her hunting, it is my way to keep myself busy, to cling on to some semblance of the person I was before the Games. I don't make it in bulk for the bakery - as arranged, I work there only on Sunday afternoons, frosting the cakes for the display window. I just make a few loaves in the morning - something routine, something busy and mindless.

With the bread rising, and the house now warm, I go to the downstairs bathroom to run a bath. The bathtub is a really nice, deep one, sitting on squat little bowed legs. It's not as sleek and sophisticated as the Capitol showers - even the ones on the train I will be living on for the next two weeks. But it's so deep, you can get a good soak in it, even dunk your head underwater.

After the bath, I go out to the living room and towel dry off in front of the fireplace. Then, I put on a robe and wander over to the paintings. The light is now good enough to see them in detail. I'll be on the train in six hours or so, so there's some time to make substitutions, if I want. But I decide to wait and get Portia's opinion. She'll be here in a few hours to help me get ready for the train.

After I knead the bread dough a second time and set it to rise some more, I figure it's late enough in the morning to go to the bakery, so I get dressed and walk into town.

After the whole Solstice dinner fiasco, everyone in the family finally seems to get it that I'm still really struggling. There is a wary, careful relationship between me and the rest of them - which is an improvement over the sullen, silent, occasionally angry one that existed when I first came home. I have tried harder to understand it from their side - they see that I am rich, alive, mostly whole. Famous, celebrated, free of obligations. My solitary moodiness must have been very difficult to understand. It's impossible to explain, entirely; so, it is on me to somehow bridge the gulf in between us.

So, I just smile and listen to how everyone else's life is going. For the four of them it is bread, bread and bread. Baking it, marketing it, selling it. The millstone of life grinding on and on. At least, there's movement for them, of some kind. Breakfast is brief. They have work to do - I've got a journey to prepare for.

Back at home, the bread is ready to bake, and I pop it in the oven. Within a few minutes, the smell of it - the warm, sweet scent - fills the house. It makes the strange house feel a little bit like home; which is a relief, because my old home feels a little bit like I never even lived there.

When the bread is done, I still have an hour or so before the team from the Capitol is due to arrive, so I walk over to Haymitch's house.

I don't bother to knock - he's probably asleep, anyway - but open the door on a dark front room and the typically noxious smell. The house is cold, too - as I go through the kitchen toward the dining room, I feel a blast of chilly air coming from an open window somewhere. Then I hear the voices.

"If you wanted to be babied, you should have asked Peeta."

The dining room scene would be alarming, if I didn't know the players. Haymitch stands, basically upright, clutching a knife that he points toward Katniss, who perches on the sill of the open window, as if ready for flight.

"Asked me what?" I say casually, finding a space on the table to set the loaf of bread down on. I hold my hand out to Haymitch, specifically to his knife.

"Asked you to wake me up without giving me pneumonia," says Haymitch, handing it over. I see now that his hair is dripping wet and I smile.

While Haymitch dries himself with his shirt, I find one of his liquor bottles and wash the knife down with alcohol, and sit down to slice up the bread. Haymitch sits down again, rubbing his temple, and I hand him the heel of the loaf. Then, I look up at Katniss.

She's looking at me with one of her unreadable expressions. I catch hints of sadness and anxiety in her dark gray eyes, but it's hard to tell if these are because of me, despite me or have anything to do with me at all. In a couple of hours, we'll be on a train again, linked together on the tour for two weeks, and it's amazing how similar it feels to the first time. Despite all the confidences and all the physical closeness in the arena - let alone our mutual debt for each other's lives - it's as if we're strangers.

"Would you like a piece?" I ask her.

"No, I ate at the Hob," she says awkwardly. "But - thank you."

"You're welcome."

"Brr," says Haymitch. "You two have got a lot of warming up to do before show time."

Katniss looks away from me, frowning. I start to feel exactly like I did when we came home - overwhelmed with depression at the state of my relationship with this girl - and I wonder how hard "show time" is going to be.

"Take a bath, Haymitch," she says, then swings around and out through the window.

Haymitch and I sit in silence for a while. Since I've eaten breakfast already, I don't join him, but watch him eat, wondering, as I often do, about the enigma that is my mentor. Although Hunger Games reruns are frequently aired on TV, I've never caught his, and he's never spoken of his Games, except to warn me of the personal consequences of killing other people.

"What's 'show time,' exactly, Haymitch?" I ask.

He blinks at me. "You know what it is, boy."

Once he says it, I immediately understand. The cameras will be on us in every district, every day for the next two weeks. They will want to see my besotted face, hear my besotted declarations of love again. Like the night of the interviews last year, I will have to put on a performance - baring again all the secrets of my actually besotted heart, for the entertainment of the crowds. Only - it will be even _worse_ this time, now that my feelings have been actually rejected.

Gloomily, I head back over to my house and have just sat down in front of the fireplace when the doorbell rings. It's my stylist and prep team - Portia, who designs my wardrobe, and Julia, Calla and Antonia, the silly, painted girls who do my hair, nails and skin.

When I went into the arena, they primped my entire body. This morning, they just wax the stubble off my chin, pluck a few stray eyebrow hairs, apply a light layer of zit cream and a light layer of makeup, trim my hair - which is curling over my eyes and down below the nape of my neck - and buff my fingernails down to perfect crescent moons.

That leaves me to Portia, who dresses me in warm and comfortable slacks, a white sweater and a new coat of midnight blue.

"What do you think of the paintings?" I ask her.

"You're a natural, Peeta," she says. "It's almost too bad that you can't get professional instruction. I honestly think you could make your living at it, if you lived in the Capitol. But if you keep doing it - and keep a critical eye on yourself - you will develop your own style and continue to improve. It's interesting, I can't think of any artists that have come out of District 12."

Of course not. It's a luxury to be one - only a Victor could afford to spend the time, to have access to the resources. "Did you - learn drawing and - everything - somewhere?" I ask curiously. As a district citizen, I'm not supposed to know anything, really, about the rest of Panem, but maybe, as a Victor, my privileges extend a little further now.

Portia hesitates for a moment, as if pondering the same question. "Yes. I went to art school. After high school. That's where I met Cinna." She smiles. "We always ended up getting paired up on projects, and here we are!"

Cinna is Katniss' stylist and he and Portia started pairing us up with matching outfits long before we took on the roles of star-crossed lovers in the arena. In fact, for all I know, they worked with Haymitch to devise this strategy even before I confessed to Haymitch how I felt about Katniss. This is something I've had time to ponder over the last few months - I can't shake this feeling that there was some larger plan cooked up among them regarding me and/or Katniss from the very beginning.

Effie Trinket arrives, in furs and gold pants, and a very striking orange wig. I greet her with a smile and she double-kisses me on my cheeks. "What a handsome young man!" she gushes. "And where are these paintings I've heard so much about?"

Given how excited she's been to get regular updates on my progress, I don't know how she's going to feel about the subject matter - the mutts and the other tributes, the sometimes-surreal efforts to recreate the strange hallucinatory images of the tracker jacker poison. She might have been hoping for benign landscapes and fruit in a bowl. I hold my breath, but she gasps in approval. "Oh - these are delightful. The perspective! The shading! You might have been painting all your life!"

"Thanks, Effie."

"We'll get these packed up and on the train for you, Peeta. Now - I'm going to go over to Katniss' and supervise her getting out of the house. I've got three cameras out on the green, so what I'd like is a shot of the two Victors greeting each other there. Portia, have Peeta leave the house and walk over the green toward Katniss' at 1pm sharp. I'll have Katniss meet him halfway. Then off to the train station!"

She vanishes, and I glance at Portia. "That's not vague," I say wryly. "By greet, does she mean for me to shake Katniss' hand, or …?"

Portia glances at me with a look very reminiscent of Haymitch. "The Capitol loves a bit of spontaneity," she says.

It takes me awhile to figure out why that is so familiar. She said the same to me when I greeted Katniss for the first time after the Games, in front of the live television audience. That ended in about ten minutes of spontaneous kissing - an act unlikely to be duplicated today. I'm not about to kiss someone who doesn't want it. A convincing hug may be in order, though.

That's better than it has been, at least. In fact, as I wait at my front door for the clock to turn to 1, I find myself anticipating it more than I would like to admit.

The snow has started coming down in a way threatening yet _another_ blizzard when Portia opens my door and waves me out. I can see Katniss in her doorway. I plaster a smile on my face and start walking over to her. But she runs. Startled, I catch her in my arms and spin her around once before losing my footing in the wet grass. I end up on my back, she on top of me.

I look up into her fur-lined face. Her burnt-sugar skin, her shining eyes. Her pink, wet lips. Her eyes bore into mine for a moment. They are trying to tell me something - or trying to hide something, I'm not sure. She licks her lips and puts them down on mine.

I close my eyes. My hands tighten on her arms as the kiss deepens, ever so slightly. The tip of her tongue slides just into the crease of my lips. I restrain my side of the embrace with an enormous effort; I understand - that this is for the cameras. I understand that she dictates the terms. But ... Then she parts from me, an apology in her eyes - but also, a tiny gleam of … what? Can't she tell that I can feel her melting into the kiss? That behind the act I can feel her curiosity?

Then Katniss stands and takes my hand to help me up.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five**

* * *

I'm the second person in the dining car for dinner - just Effie is in before me, as punctual as ever. She's sitting back, frowning at a clipboard. There's a map spread out on the table in front of her and I glance at it, curious - I've never actually seen a map of Panem; we are only given the broadest clues about where the Districts are in relation to each other and to the Capitol. But this isn't much of a geographical map - it's a rail map, and all I see are lines representing tracks and dots representing stations, and a bunch of arrows pointing every which way.

"It's not just the speed," Effie tells me, as if I've asked her the question. "It's the pace. Some distances between Districts are greater than others. We have to time everything - just - so. Should be fine until the District 4 to District 3 transfer."

"Is that why we're going so slow this time?"

She nods, not even looking up from her notes. "Yes, District 11 is less than three hours away, at top speeds."

Oh. Interesting. Capitol news reporters refer to District 11 as one of the outer eastern districts - like 12 itself - but all the pictures of it I've ever seen shows it to be considerably flatter and sunnier than District 12, so I've always vaguely thought of it as being quite far to the south. The rail map confirms it is south of us, but not how far. And since the top speed of the Capitol trains is about 250 miles an hour….

"What is it? What's so funny?" asks Effie, looking at me sharply as I chuckle.

"Nothing, just - nothing." I smile at her. It's really Katniss I wish was in here, now; she might appreciate the joke. Math - in District 12 - is about 80% word problems involving the speed of trains carrying coal to the Capitol.

By the time Katniss joins us, Haymitch, Cinna, Portia and I have already started in on soup, and I'm actually laughing at a story Cinna and Portia are telling in tandem about the rush on their shop to get mockingjay-inspired fashions - the current rage in the Capitol. This is because Katniss wore a mockingjay pin into the arena last year - and the mockingjays themselves made an appearance, briefly, at the end. The mockingjay - now that I think about it, it's a strangely hopeful symbol. Its mother was the mockingbird. Its father was the jabberjay, a mutation of the mother bird, engineered by the Capitol to spy on the rebellion during the Dark Days. Their use ended, the jabberjays were released back into the wild, to go extinct. Yet, the bird was able to reconnect with its natural roots - to mate with the mockingbird, despite its engineering, and its offspring, the mockingjay, is a rather lovely combination of the two - a singer and a signal-caller of prodigious talent.

As the mutated form of myself, now, I'll take anything that promises something useful, purposeful - or at the least, beautiful - can somehow come out of my trauma.

Later, I sit in my room and ruminate over my paintings, wondering if this is it - the purpose, the use. They please me - they do. But they are not adequate. Not big enough to compensate. I keep picturing Katniss, who at the dinner table was, unlike the rest of us, quiet and reserved. In my months of self-absorbed, self-imposed exile, I haven't given enough thought to what _she_ has been going through since the Games. She might have a better support system in place than I do, but - and I _know_ this to be true - no matter how sympathetic her mother, her sister and even Gale may be, they can't possibly understand what she's been through the way that I can.

And I need her - for just this reason. Not to satiate the pain of unrequited calf love - that's my job to figure out, not hers. Not even to fulfill the promise of the friendship that started to spark to life in the Capitol. I know that she, alone among anyone else in District 12 - even Haymitch - would understand: not to ask me about the Games, not to fret over the loss of my leg, not to congratulate me on my fortune, not to envy my trip to the Capitol. She would know exactly what to say or to not say. I need that.

I wish I hadn't been such a fool. I _didn't_ know what to say, and so I said the exact wrong thing - asked the exact wrong question. Perhaps I can make things right on this trip. After all, regardless of whatever happens in the future, we're going to be neighbors forever in Victors' Village, mentors together in the Games.

Sleep comes no easier on the train than it does at home. I stay up late with Portia and Cinna, and they teach me card games. Then I stay up even later, working on my speech for District 11. The Capitol sent Katniss and I some canned remarks for each district. Since there are two of us, they split our comments in half so that I'll start each speech and Katniss will finish. District 11 demands more than the Capitol remarks, though. Rue and Thresh were the tributes from 11, and Katniss and I owe them our lives. Katniss teamed up with Rue. Thresh, in gratitude for Katniss' alliance with Rue, spared her life at the Cornucopia when he had her at his mercy. I know she was devastated by Rue's death; I remember how upset even Thresh's made her, although he was a substantial barrier to us getting out of the arena alive.

So, something should be said - something special - about these two tributes who, like us, are from one of the poor, outlying districts.

Late the next morning, Effie finds me, still scratching up notes on the Capitol's notecards. She's followed by my prep team, who touch me up for Portia. When that's done, I go out to the dining car for an expansive brunch, and I eat hungrily. Cinna and Portia greet me with smiles and we carry on with conversations we started last night. Haymitch looks predictably wan and picks at a muffin that he's not really eating. Katniss shows up late, dressed and made up, but sulky. No, more than that. She looks heavy-hearted.

Cinna asks her what she's been doing this winter, but she waves him off with a reply of 'nothing, really," and sips her broth.

The train stops and Effie runs out of the dining car to check on what's happening. When she comes back, her face is almost as orange as her wig. "Well, there's been a malfunction, of all things. We're grounded until they fix it. We're losing at least an hour." From nowhere, she pulls out her clipboard and starts crossing things out and scribbling furiously and muttering to herself.

Katniss bursts out, "No one cares, Effie! Well – no one does," she adds defensively, as we all stare at her. Then she gets up and leaves.

Haymitch groans and starts to rise, but I stop him. "No, Haymitch - I'll talk to her," I say firmly.

Katniss is easy to track as, in unsurprising fashion, she has left the train entirely, and a small alarm is going off in her wake. I ignore it and jump down onto the firm ground outside.

Winter doesn't seem to be in this place, wherever we are, however far south we've come. It's warm and the sun is out. We're in flatter country than District 12, but it's not completely flat, and it's pleasantly green. I look down toward the end of the train and see Katniss, sitting next to the tracks. As I approach her, she doesn't look up, just glares at the ground. "I'm not in the mood for a lecture," she snaps.

"I'll try to keep it brief."

I sit down next to her in the grass and adjust my prosthetic leg, which in delicate movements never seems to want to move the same direction as the right leg. She watches me. "I thought you were Haymitch."

"No, he's still working on that muffin. Bad day, huh?"

"It's nothing."

I look at her and take a deep breath. This is the moment to repair the damage I've done over the last six months; it's just going to be altogether painful. "Look, Katniss, I've been wanting to talk to you about the way I acted on the train - the last one, I mean. I knew you had something with Gale." I swallow painfully, but press on. It feels really good to be honest, anyway. "I was jealous of him before I officially met you. Anyway - it wasn't fair to hold you to anything that happened in the Games. I'm sorry."

She looks at me in surprise. "I'm sorry, too," she says, which is touching, if enigmatic.

"You don't have anything to be sorry for," I reply, and as I say it I _do_ , I actually do believe it - and something in me feels lighter. "You were just keeping us alive. But I don't want us to go on like this, ignoring each other in real life, and falling into the snow every time there's a camera around. So, I thought if I stopped being so - you know - wounded, we could take a shot at just being friends."

A worried smile just creases her face. "OK."

"So, what's wrong?"

She looks away from me, frowning again, and starts pulling up weeds. So - I guess it has something to do with me. Probably a lot to do with her resentment of the romance strategy I initiated, and the need for it to resurface again to disrupt her life.

But I'm determined to get something out of this conversation, some spark of - something. "Let's start with something more basic, then. Isn't it strange how I know you'd risk your life to save mine … but I don't know what your favorite color is?"

Her smile is more genuine this time, it quirks up, in spite of herself. "Green. What's yours?"

I ponder this for a second. I love all colors, some more than others at different times. But an image comes to me - the dusk of the arena that I have been trying, unsuccessfully, to capture in paint over the last couple of months - and the particularly elusive color, a translucent peach, tinted with hints of hot pink and blazing yellow. Like fire, if fire was sifted soft as powdered sugar. "Orange."

"Orange? Like Effie's hair?"

"A bit more muted. More like … sunset."

She narrows her eyes, as if imagining it, and she gives a small nod, then glances at me, almost shyly. "You know, everyone's always raving about your paintings. I feel bad I haven't seen them."

"Well, I've got a whole train car full," I reply. I get up and hold out my hand. "Come on."

She takes it without hesitation, and her fingers in mine are warm and firm. Before we go to my car, she stops by to offer Effie an apology so effusive I think even Effie must see through it - but she apparently finds it perfectly appropriate.

I pull the paintings out from the box they are being transported in and lay them out, one by one, on my bed. Katniss frowns at them as she looks at them, and I'm a little nervous. Maybe she won't like that so many of the paintings I brought are actually of her. I wait anxiously for her assessment.

"What do you think?" I ask, finally.

She shakes her head, and smiles at me, but sadly. "I hate them," she says. "All I do is go around trying to forget the arena and you've brought it back to life. How do you remember these things so exactly?"

"I see them every night."

Her expression is one of instant sympathy, and I know she's thinking of her own nightmares. "Me, too," she whispers. "Does it help?"

I shrug. "I don't know, but I think I'm a little bit less afraid of going to sleep at night - or I tell myself I am. But they haven't gone anywhere."

"Maybe they won't," she says, matter-of-factly - though there is a haunted look in her eye. "Haymitch's haven't."

"No," I agree. "But for me, it's better to wake up with a paintbrush than a knife in my hand." I look at her carefully. "So, you really hate them?"

"Yes, but they're extraordinary - really," she says, and I blush in spite of myself. "Want to see my talent? Cinna did a great job on it."

I laugh. Katniss' clothing line - I heard all about that last night. "Later." All of a sudden, the train groans back to life and we're moving again. "Come on," I say, holding my hand out again. "We're almost to District 11. Let's go take a look at it."

We walk to the last car on the train, which is a sitting car whose side windows retract entirely - at least when the train is traveling at a reasonable speed - allowing the passengers to experience the open air and the winds of the train's passage. Seeing more of the flat plains - sunshine or not - makes me miss the hills of home. But after a few minutes, the view changes. The train slows down as it enters the borders of District 11. The fence is both higher and more frightening than the fence around District 12. It is intact, not saggy or with obvious gaps, and the coils of barbed wire at its top look well maintained and it is secured to the ground by a thick metal base.

The unbroken plain is suddenly replaced by crops. As far as the eye can see, it reminds me of Thresh's territory in the arena, squares of different plants, growing tall, green and yellow, some of them flowering. The fields are divided by rows of small shacks. People are bent double in the crops; picking, maybe, or weeding. Along the train tracks, every couple hundred yards, it seems like, are short towers, topped with guns and manned with Peacekeepers.

"That's something different," I say.

As we pass them, the crop-pickers straighten up to watch us pass, their expressions hidden under the wide brims of their straw hats. The rabid delight of the Capitol citizens, greeting us when we arrived as tributes, is nowhere to be seen. Mouths are grim.

We think that any minute we will stop at a train station, but the train keeps going on and on and on. At even the slow speed we are going now, we could have driven straight through District 12 three or four times before Effie finds us and tells us it's time to get dressed.

The train is still moving when we reconvene to get our last orders from Effie. I raise my eyebrows at Katniss, who is dressed in an orange frock with puffy sleeves and a pattern of leaves in gold thread. I know she doesn't have the ordering of her wardrobe, so the color - so soon after our conversation - can only be a coincidence.

"We'll be met at the train station and driven to the town square. You'll greet the crowd on the veranda; the mayor will introduce you and that is when you will read the response we sent you."

I glance at Katniss. "Do you want me to read the entire thing?" I ask her, remembering how she hates performing on stages.

She shakes her head. "I practiced my part," she says. "But … I know we should say something - about Rue and Thresh." She swallows. "I just - couldn't figure out what to write."

"I've got something that can work for both us," I tell her.

"Really?" She smiles in surprise.

"Sure - just have to switch out some pronouns," I say, smiling back.

Finally, finally the train stops. Cinna makes a quick adjustment to Katniss' hair and Portia brushes the back of my coat. Then we disembark and are met by Peacekeepers who escort us into an armored truck. Like everything else we've seen of District 11 so far, there's a whiff of oppression to the drive from the station. Effie frets that we are being treated like common criminals.

We disembark at the back of a Justice Center that seems to be roughly the same size as ours, but surprisingly is even more dilapidated. We're greeted by Capitol cameramen, who clip microphones to us. Katniss looks dazed and pale, so I grab her hand as we are ushered forcefully out to the veranda by Effie.

The mayor is concluding his introduction as we step out into the sun. I stare curiously out at the town center, which in many ways is similar to ours. It just looks less cared for. Paint is peeling, windows are broken on the shops that I assume are the equivalent of the merchant shops in which I used to live. Cameras are on rooftops opposite us - but also, more guns and Peacekeepers. The citizens before us - a crowd vast, packed in, so much larger than anything District 12 could drum up on our best day - lift their faces to us and I notice two things at once. One is that there is so much more diversity to the population than there is in 12. The shades of the faces run the spectrum from ash white to dark brown. They are not divided - as we so often divide in 12, between merchant and seam - but mingle together in the dense crowd. And two, though their skin tone varies greatly, they are all stamped with the same grim, hungry expression that marks them as bound together tightly by forces so much more powerful than genetics.

I follow Katniss' eyes down to the area below us, at the foot of the stairs, where Thresh and Rue's families sit in places of honor, under banners painted with their pictures. Thresh's family includes one young woman - tall, broad and imposing, like Thresh - and a very old woman. Rue's includes both young parents and four young children, impossibly small like Rue was. At twelve, Rue was young enough, but with her wispy stature she looked even younger. With a pang, I remember her, shadowing Katniss and I at the training center. And then - dead, with a spear stuck in her middle. The very example of the Capitol's disregard for innocence, for basic human decency. It was another child - Marvel, one of the District 1 tributes - who actually killed her. But who put him there in the first place?

Last night I was on the verge of a decision - of offering more than mere words for the comfort of Rue's and Thresh's families - and the faces below me push me over the edge. I'm only vaguely aware of receiving a bouquet of flowers from a little girl before I start the Capitol's address, praising District 11 for sending its capable tributes to the Games. Katniss murmurs the concluding remarks. Then she looks at me, expectantly. I close my eyes and count to three.

"Katniss and I wanted to add something more about Thresh and Rue, because, of course, we owe them more than we do most of the other tributes who went into the arena with us. They had very different strengths, but they were both incredible survivors. They did honor to you all by making it to the Final Eight - and not through violence, but because they were both smart and skilled enough to survive. Both Thresh and Rue helped keep Katniss alive - which kept me alive, as well, and we can never repay that debt." I pause, take a breath. "But - and it can in no way replace your losses - but, as a token of our thanks, we'd like for each of the tributes' families from District 11 to receive one month of our winnings, every year for the duration of our lives."

The crowd gives a collective gasp, and for a moment their faces are animated with something - confusion mainly. I glance over at Katniss and see that she is looking up at me as if she has never seen me before. Her eyes are wet as she stands on her tiptoes to kiss me right on the lips.

I suppose Effie - maybe even Haymitch - will yell at me when we get inside. I also suppose there's no real mechanism to do what I promised. But I'm determined, if possible, to make sure it is done. I'll be at the games every year now, as a mentor, and money can be passed discreetly through the 11 mentors. One of them is one of Haymitch's closest friends, as a matter of fact.

The mayor steps forward - perhaps a little belatedly - to hand us each a heavy plaque. He's gesturing us back toward the doors of the Justice Building when Katniss suddenly cries, "Wait!" and lurches forward. "Please, wait!"

The crowd, which had been beginning to stir, obeys her by freezing immediately, so that her voice echoes over their heads. "I want to give my thanks to the tributes of District 11. I only spoke to Thresh one time, but it was long enough for him to spare my life. I didn't know him, but I always respected him - for his power. For his refusal to play the Game on anyone's terms but his. The Careers wanted him to team up with them from the beginning, but he wouldn't do it. I respected him for that."

There is a hush in the air, a strange sense of waiting. "But I feel as if I did know Rue," she continues. "And she'll always be with me. Everything beautiful brings her to mind. I see her in the yellow flowers that grow in the Meadow by my house. I see her in the mockingjays that sing in the trees. But most of all, I see her in my sister, Prim. Thank you for your children," she says softly. Then she lifts her chin, as if reenacting a moment in the arena. "And thank you all for the bread."

From the silent crowd comes a whistle - four notes, the notes Katniss sang at the end of the game, which she told me was Rue's song. The man – a man so old that his brown skin is fading into the color of parchment - stands dead center near the front of the crowd, not far behind where Rue's and Thresh's families are seated. Then, the crowd suddenly, as if as one, presses their three middle fingers to their lips and raises them in a salute.

My brain can't make sense of this. This is a District 12 salute - strictly District 12, or so I have always thought. It is a sign of both goodbye and respect, usually used at funerals. When Katniss volunteered to replace her sister at the reaping last year, we gave her this same salute. Even then - it kind of spread through the crowd. This tribute happens all at once, as if it was planned. As if Katniss' mention of bread was some sort of signal. But - how? Why?

The display then dissolves into a more normal gesture, as the crowd applauds. Katniss turns around with a stricken face. She is not just stunned, but frightened. I feel a sudden urgent need to get inside, and I put a hand on her back to hurry her forward. But she pauses outside the doors and sways on her feet.

"Are you all right?"

"Just dizzy," she replies. "The sun was so bright. Oh, I forgot my flowers," she says, glancing at my bouquet.

"I'll get them."

"I can."

We both turn around toward the crowd at the same time. At that moment, a frightened noise rises from the people. A pair of Peacekeepers have dragged the old man who whistled up to the top of the steps, where we just gave our speeches. He is forced to his knees. And shot through the head.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter Six**

* * *

The Peacekeepers surround us at once, but it's not soon enough. I've seen the spray of blood and pink flesh. Then I notice the gun pressed against Katniss - lengthwise, but its proximity fills my mouth with acid, anyway. I shove the Peacekeeper away from her. "We're going! We get it, all right!" It may not be the most politic thing I have ever done, but I can think of nothing except for getting her away from their weapons. I throw my arm around her shoulders and lead her back into the Justice Building. All the while, the hum and noise of the crowd behind us fills my head.

Once inside the building, we stumble over to where Haymitch, Effie, Portia and Cinna are standing, staring at a screen mounted to the wall. There is no picture there - just static.

Effie notices us first and lurches toward us, her dark orange wig slightly off-kilter. But I'm happy to see her - it's as if we had peeled off a layer of this silly, colorful world to reveal the horrors underneath, and I just want to cover it up again. "What happened?" she asks. "We lost the feed just after Katniss' lovely speech, and then Haymitch thought he heard gun fire, and I said it was ridiculous …"

I tune her out and look to Haymitch. The gray tint of his face speaks volumes. He knows. "Nothing happened, Effie," I say, mustering every ounce of calm to my defense. "An old truck backfired."

Two more gunshots ring out at this moment and I feel Katniss waver under my arm.

"Both of you. With me." Haymitch brushes past us and we hurry behind him. He makes for the main staircase and we follow him there, up to the landing, then through a double door into a huge room with chairs and sofas, tables laid out with fruit, water and wine. Our clothes are hung on portable racks against one wall.

Haymitch pauses, looks around, then - pressing his finger to his lips - he reaches out and in two quick motions pulls the microphones off the clips on our chests and stuffs them under a couch cushion. He waves at us to follow him as he sprints from the room, up another staircase, through a series of corridors and old rooms and up to an attic, covered in dust and cobwebs and filled with old furniture, toys, boxes and weapons. He pulls up the ladder and closes the attic door behind us and we stand in the semi-darkness for a while, staring at each other. All the time, Haymitch listens, listens. And I don't understand what is going on - but Katniss' face is as a mirror of his, so whatever it is, it's not a complete surprise to either of them. Though it might be a shock.

"What happened?" he asks at last.

I glance at Katniss. "Well, after we gave our speeches - I mean, after Katniss gave her speech, for Thresh and Rue, there was an old man who whistled in the square. Rue's whistle," I clarify, since Haymitch should remember that from the Games. "Then - the entire square gave a farewell salute, just like we do at home. We were heading back inside and Katniss realized she forgot her flowers, so we turned around and …." I swallow. "We saw the old man being dragged up to the top of the stairs. And - they shot him. Haymitch - what is going on?"

He looks at Katniss. "It will be better coming from you," he says.

She shakes her head slightly, but looks at me, and her face is almost completely drained of color.

"Katniss?" I ask.

"I'm sorry," she prefaces. "OK, so, just before we left District 12 yesterday - President Snow came to visit me. At my house."

"What!?"

"He told me - that - the people in the districts didn't believe us, at the end of the Games. He said that some of them are on the verge of - uprisings."

I gape at her. "Uprisings? ' _Believe_ us?' What do you mean?"

"He said that when I - when we - decided to use the berries, instead of - you know ... some of the districts used that as an inspiration, I guess, for rebellion." She shrugs lightly. "He told me that I - that we _need_ to prove to the districts that it wasn't a rebellious act, but just because we were so ... in love. He threatened …" she stops and squints. "He threatened that a war might follow uprisings - if we couldn't contain it soon. He told me that Seneca Crane - the Gamemaker who allowed us both to live - was executed. And he threatened my family and - friends. He warned me - that he knew we hadn't been keeping up - the act. He even knew that Gale kissed me once."

Haymitch stirs, but I'm rooted in place. Katniss glances at Haymitch, but then looks closely at me, as if silently begging me to understand. "I just wanted to keep on like I always have, go back to how it was before. But I can't. And I was supposed to fix things on the tour. Make everyone who doubted believe that I acted out of love. Calm things down. But obviously, all I've done today is get three people killed, and now everyone in the square will be punished."

She collapses onto an old couch. Both she and Haymitch look up at me, waiting for my reaction, as if I'm a little kid they've disappointed somehow. A rush of anger - composed equally of frustration, jealousy and terror - comes over me. I'm almost dizzy with the sensation- the heat - of it. "Then I made things worse, too. By giving away the money." There's something next to me - it's an old lamp or something - and I swipe at it angrily, knocking it down. Glass and dust scatter around me, and it's kind of satisfying. I glare at the gray-faced girl. "This has to stop. Right now. This - this - game you two play, where you tell each other secrets but keep them from me, like I'm too inconsequential or stupid or weak to handle them!"

"It's not like that, Peeta -" she starts, as if she could possibly fix any of this, retroactively.

"It's exactly like that! I have people I care about, too! Family and friends back in 12 who will be just as dead as yours if we don't pull this thing off." The hurt is a physical thing inside me now, a burning sensation. Why the hell didn't she just let me die? Seriously, it would have been better than this. "So, after all we went through in the arena, don't I even rate the truth from you?"

She drops her eyes and Haymitch steps in. "You're always so reliably good, Peeta. So smart about how you present yourself before the cameras. I didn't want to disrupt that."

I stare at him a moment. Cameras? Presentation? So, I'm still just an actor in someone else's pageant. In the meanwhile, I just saw someone's head get blown off. Real life is intruding. "Well, you overestimated me," I spit at him. "Because I really screwed up today. What do you think is going to happen to Rue and Thresh's families? Do you think they'll get their share of our winnings? Do you think I gave them a bright future? Because I think they'll be lucky to survive the day!" The thought of those delicate little kids - Rue's siblings, whom she protected so fiercely - makes my eyes blur. And I see people - other people I couldn't save. Kids, also. Dylan and Bet and Neon ….

There's an old, broken statuette on a shelf between me and Haymitch, and I throw it across the room, because I'm absolutely powerless to do anything else. Even among this trio of District 12 Victors, I'm nothing but the mouthpiece. Then I look down at Katniss, who looks small, sad and scared. This second act of destruction wasn't quite as satisfying at the first, so now I just deflate back down into depression.

"He's right, Haymitch," she says, looking up at me again. "We were wrong not to tell him. Even back in the Capitol."

Oh, yes. Something else I haven't thought about in a long time. Things that slowly dawned on me after I returned home and remembered everything that happened in the Games - sleep syrup sent to control me - food sent as a reward for her pretending to like me. "Even in the arena - you two had some sort of system worked out, didn't you? Something I wasn't part of."

"No, not officially. I just could tell what Haymitch wanted me to do by what he sent, or didn't send."

It all comes flooding back in, the feeling of being the leftover tribute; _willing_ to give myself up for her, but no acknowledgement of it on her side. And nothing from Haymitch but his scowls and his reminders to 'stay alive,' as if that was even useful advice. "Well, I never had that opportunity. Because he never sent me anything until you showed up."

Katniss looks at me sharply. She knew this before, but maybe she never really thought about how it felt to me. She looks so sorry for me that I _almost_ have to forgive her.

"Look, boy," says Haymitch.

But I don't want to hear from him. I can't ever be sure if he's telling me the truth, or just what's convenient to whatever scheme he happens to be working on. I've wanted so badly to trust him, and again I've been fooling myself. "Don't bother, Haymitch. I know you had to choose one of us. And I'd have wanted it to be her. But this is something different. People are dead out there. More will follow, unless we're very good. We all know I'm better than Katniss in front of the cameras. No one needs to coach me on what to say. But I have to know what I'm walking in to."

"From now on, you'll be fully informed."

I shake my head. "I better be." Then I turn on my heel, pull open the door, lower the ladder and leave them.

I wander down hallways and stairs for a while, until I find the big landing and the big marble staircase. I go into the big room, and see, of course, Portia, sitting patiently on the couch, waiting for me. She gives me a smile.

"Doing OK?"

"I've been better."

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"No." I try to smile. "For one thing, I'm not sure I'm allowed."

"Got you. Ready to change for dinner?"

"Any time," I say, and let her lead me away.

She leads me to some fancy guest bedroom, and while I shower, I run through all the threads of my anger, separating them out into manageable parts. Frustration is spent, shattered into pieces in the attic. Besides, if I'm fair, it's not like either Haymitch or Katniss have a working blueprint for how to manage this situation. It's brand new, it's _terrifying._ I even try to take comfort in the fact that they are that confident in my speaking abilities. My skill in front of the cameras is such a recent discovery, I am constantly surprising even myself. But I don't believe for a minute that Katniss' decision not to confide in me has anything to do with that.

It's this romance thing, again. She can't talk about it because it upsets or embarrasses her that much. And because she's never really been able to talk to me about Gale. (And, apparently, there is not as much there as I thought. _He kissed me once?_ That was a really unexpected revelation.)

The problem is … the problem is … there's no escaping it. And it's not me. I may have initiated it, stumbling like a bull into the strategy of star-crossed lovers, but it's moved beyond me. The story of me and Katniss belongs to the Capitol now, and any whisper of hope that there might one day be a genuine spark of romance with her - cultivated over time, when this whole mess was behind us - dissolves like the hot air that it is. This mess will never be behind us. In ten days or so, we'll be in the Capitol. In a few months, we'll be back there again, for the Games, holding hands and kissing for the cameras again. And the year after that. And the year after that.

Unless, I think suddenly, there really are uprisings. Unless there really is a rebellion. But that seems absurd. The citizens of the districts are beat down, weak and unarmed. I can see how they would take inspiration from Katniss - I can easily see it. But she's - a mistake. She's not a spawn of oppression like the rest of us. She had her father, who flouted Capitol restrictions as if they didn't exist. And taught her the same. You'd need hundreds like her, in every district, to maintain a rebellion. Wouldn't you?

When I get out of the shower, my skin is pink and wrinkled, and my head is reeling with my thoughts. I'm startled to find not just Portia but Haymitch in my room. I frown at him while I tie my towel around my waist. "Yes?"

"Peeta," he says. Then he frowns, and pauses. _Don't,_ I think _\- don't. Don't make something up in your head, some more diplomatic way to tell me. Just tell me._ "I know you're mad, and I get it. I do. But you can't be mad at Katniss. Not for this. I told her before, you work best in spontaneity, and she was simply continuing that strategy. Obviously, things are changing."

"I'm not mad at Katniss."

He narrows his eyes at me. "If you want me to be straight with you, you need to learn to be straight with yourself."

"I'm not mad at Katniss," I repeat. "Am I disappointed? Of course, _of course_ I am! But she didn't ask to deal with my feelings. Or even her feelings for me, whatever they are. I created that mess, and now we'll never see the end of it."

"I'm glad you figured that out."

I shake my head. "I'm not just the pretty face of this trio," I snark.

His face almost breaks into an actual smile.

"But," I add more seriously, "I'd figure things out faster if people would clue me in on at least the basic information."

"Yes, I agree. ... Peeta … don't think she's - indifferent to you. If she was, she wouldn't be trying so hard to protect you."

"Yeah, I know that, too, Haymitch," I say coolly. But whether he means it, or is just saying it in order to get a better performance out of me, I'm strangely comforted, nonetheless.

Portia doesn't say anything while I dress. I wish I knew how much she and Cinna know about what's going on. I've always suspected it was slightly more than she ever let on. But I can't put her at risk by confiding about what's actually happening, so I'm silent; it's sad, because I was able to talk to her so freely last year.

I don't even process what she dresses me in; it will match or complement Katniss' outfit, as usual. She leaves me to my prep team to touch up my hair and makeup, then they go with me downstairs to join the rest of the party outside the dining room.

Effie is arranging everyone in a processional. My prep team is needed at the front of the line; I will enter last, with Katniss. I approach her, crossing a black and white tile floor to where she stands under an elaborately-carved marble arch. She's dressed in a pink strapless gown. There's a silver wrap around her arms, but her shoulders are bare and I stare at them with a heightened sort of longing. Her skin glows under the thin yellow light from the wall lamps. Her hair is in loose, flirty curls. And then it dawns on me. Cinna _is_ dressing her for me, because it's my job tonight to do - in pretense - what I would be tempted to do in real life. To flirt with her in front of the cameras. To try to persuade kisses from her pink lips. To come up with a reason to touch the skin of her shoulders. And it will be her job to accept all this.

Some music starts up and the prep teams go down a short staircase to the formal dining room. She turns to me with a smile and I take her hand. She smells like a teenage girl - like strawberries and cream. And it's so out of place.

I clear my throat. "Haymitch says I was wrong to yell at you. You were only operating under his instructions. And - it isn't as if I haven't kept things from you in the past."

"I think I broke a few things myself after that interview," she says in a soft voice.

"Just an urn."

"And your hands." She takes her free hand and places it on mine so that it is encased in the shell of her fingers. "There's no point to it, anymore, though, is there? Not being straight with each other?"

She must know - as I do - that we are bound together, now, in this deception, at least until we can find a way out of it. "No point," I answer.

But before I can go on with this, I need to know. Because our pageant involves more than the two of us - especially one other person - perhaps, very intimately. How intimately? I need to know. "Was that really the only time you kissed Gale?"

"Yes," she says, so immediately, and with such a surprised expression, that I know she is not lying to me. That makes me feel better - to know that, although I may be interfering with a potential romance, I'm not intruding on an actual relationship. I tell myself it's because it will help me act more naturally, more freely. That's what I tell myself.

We descend the stairs together. Katniss has to hold up the long skirts of her dress, so I help her keep her balance by crooking my arm around hers. She's always been graceful, but she's developed an elegance, too, since last summer. She raises her chin just a little to meet the applause of the crowd as we enter the dining room.

It's very similar, in some respects, to the all-night feast that followed our coronation in the Capitol last year - clusters of tables, with a special one set aside for her and me. But this time, there is very little mingling among the guests, and certainly fewer people come up to talk with us. Most people are here to eat - probably many of them are here out of some obligation to be, as the statespersons of the district. Whatever, they don't have a lot to say to us. I catch sight of Haymitch, sitting at a far table with some people he seems to know pretty well. I'm reminded that one of his best - one of his only - friends is one of the District 11 Victors.

At one point, Effie floats by to remind us there is dancing after dinner and we are expected to lead it. "Did you watch the tape?" she asks us.

I nod, then glance at Katniss, curiously. Effie sent me - and her, presumably - an instruction video on formal dancing. Sitting by oneself in a living room, watching a tape, is probably not the best way to learn dancing, but it seemed easy enough. Put your hands here and move your feet to and fro.

Eventually, Katniss nods assent and Effie drifts away again. I lean into her. "Look," I say softly, my lips almost brushing her cheek. "You tell me if I cross a line, but when we're dancing it might … be a good time to …."

She nods and her hair tickles my nose.

The slow dancing makes it very easy to fall right back into the act. She's close to me in a way she hasn't really been before, even counting when she helped me get undressed to check out my wounds and clean my clothes in the arena. That was all business - and I was barely conscious, anyway. Now, I'm hyper-aware of every last inch of her. I have to try not to look down at a certain angle, in order to avoid gawking at the place where the curves of her breasts meet the pink frill of her dress.

"You look beautiful," I tell her.

"That's Cinna's doing," she responds, predictably.

I smile at that. "I don't think I've said it to you before - after all these dresses and appearances. I remember - when you found me in the arena, and you were so skinny and dirty - I remember thinking you were the most beautiful thing I had ever seen."

I don't mention the other time - the image of her that has haunted me these past six months. When she held out the berries to me, she looked like someone not even of this earth. Gaunt and desperate, the choice of life or death in her hands.

"Well," she says, "you were dying at the time."

I laugh. "Of course, that must be it."

We close our dance by kissing gently as the music fades, and then other couples come on to the floor and we make our way to the wall near the staircase - far away from our prep teams, getting drunk on the punch on the opposite wall - far from Effie, who is chatting with Portia over by a large fireplace - far from Haymitch. Katniss leans against the wall, complaining about her shoes, and I lean over her - again trying very hard to keep my eyes from misbehaving.

"No lines yet?" I ask her.

She flutters her eyes up to me. "What have you been up to - besides painting - all these months?"

"Not much else. I do some cake decorating for my dad, but that's no more than a couple of hours a week."

"I know."

"What?"

She blushes. "I mean - I saw that you were still doing the cakes. I mean - I could tell they were yours."

"Oh," I say. "Thanks?"

She lightly slaps my arm. "You know that was a compliment. You should learn to take them better."

"So should you," I grin.

She wrinkles her nose at me. "The cakes are what you do. My looks are what Cinna does. It's nothing to do with what I do."

I absently take a strand of her curled hair, straighten it out and let it go to watch it bounce back into shape. Despite the fact that it's all so painfully false, I'm actually grateful for the opportunity to say what I've been longing to say. "You're _beautiful_ ," I tell her, "even without all the makeup and sparkles. And the fact is that you're gorgeous right now. But you're right - perhaps I should go whisper that to Cinna. I have a feeling it won't play as well in the Capitol, though."

"We mustn't go off-script," she agrees, but lightly.

"Maybe one day…."

"What?" she asks warily.

I look again at her serious silver eyes. "Maybe one day, they'll get tired of this script and they'll want a different one," I say very softly.

She glances around for the nearest cameraman. "I'm afraid it won't be a different script," she tells me. "It will be more and more they want out of the current one."

In the wreck of her eyes, I see the same bleak future. But I smile. "We'll figure something out."

She takes my hand in hers and squeezes it tightly. I bend down to kiss her lips, and then, because I really want to know what it feels like - and who knows what Cinna's wardrobe choices will be in the future - I touch my lips very gently to her left shoulder. She shakes her head.

"Line?" I ask her, still smiling.

"I don't know … maybe. Maybe - build up to it? We have a lot of districts left to go."


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven**

* * *

"Peeta," says Calla, "Your eyebrows are going to be the death of me."

The entire room giggles - my three preps and Katniss' team. Katniss just looks over at me with a wan smile and I shrug. I just came in to hang out with her while she is being prepped - I was supposedly ready an hour ago. But my prep team was there, too, so I found myself back in a chair, lights and magnifying glasses shining in my face, the better to see any flaws.

"His hair is so light - it's practically invisible," Calla continues, explaining to the room at large while she grabs her tweezers and plucks the offending hair.

I don't ask - despite the millionth temptation - why my invisible hair needs to be removed. I just suppress a yawn - last night, my nightmares included something new: some version of the slaughterhouses we toured in District 10 two days ago. I'm not squeamish - not really - but my head can't help making the grotesque comparisons - the shapeless lumps of dead flesh, and what was left of Cato at the end of the Games. Am I supposed to accept it - now that I am part of it - that the Games are inhumane and that's that? How? How do I do it?

"Sweetie" says one of Katniss' team, suddenly. "I thought you went to bed with your makeup on, but these are just dark circles. What's happening here? You should have said something - I would have prepared a mask. As it is, I'll need to rethink your foundation …."

I squint at her. Now that it's mentioned, her face is unnaturally pale, except for underneath her eyes. She looks away from me, up at the ceiling. "I'm not sleeping very well," she explains.

For the rest of the day, I let this go, as I have been dreading District 8 for some time - maybe from the day I woke up in the Training Center after the last games were over. Walking out onto the stage, I try not to let it take over - that creeping sensation, the dread and the horror of it all as the dark trees part on the clearing with the fire.

The town square itself could not look more different from the woods at night. We look out over a great industrial complex - buildings made of cold metal; not a green thing in sight. The air smells of the un-alive: oiled machines, waste products, gasoline fumes. But the sound is in my ears - a crackling fire, the crackle of dead branches.

I look down and see her face on the banners. She had a full head of dark-colored hair and soft hands - velvety soft. They are staring at me - what remains of her family - but I can't look down at them, can't meet the eyes. The canned speech, so ridiculous … _who cares, Effie?_ I think to myself, even as I read the words, about the beauty of noble sacrifices … so inadequate. She didn't want to die for her district. She wanted to live. And if she didn't know how to defend herself in the arena - well, good on her. She was gentle, and innocent, and her pulse was like the beat of a song ….

I feel Katniss' lips, softly, against the knuckle of my hand. By this sign I know for sure that I am stumbling over the words and that she, for once, is trying to pick me up. Pax … the word swims around my card - that is the name of the girl I sat with in the woods, desperately waiting for her to die - all to maintain my standing with the Careers. And I didn't even know her name until now. I hate this. I hate this. I _hate this_.

"What's wrong?" Katniss asks me later, coming upon me sitting on the floor in the outer parlor of our room in the Justice Hall.

I shake my head. "It's that girl. I can't get her out of my head."

"Yeah, I know," she says, joining me on the floor.

"You'll mess up your dress," I protest. It's a lovely, foamy dress, pale blue and glossy.

She shrugs that off. "Do you want to talk about it?"

I consider it, then shake my head. "No time," I say. "And - I'm not sure I'm ready. Maybe - someday, though. Thanks. What's wrong with you?" I ask her, getting a good look at her heavily made-up face and remembering. "You look thinner. As well as tired."

"I can't sleep. I can't eat. And it's not just nightmares. It's this _impossible_ task. Did you see that crowd out there today? They looked ten times angrier than the people in 11. And their lives - in those factories - they must be miserable. Why _wouldn't_ they rebel?"

I hadn't processed it, but I think back now over our appearance. District 8 seems large and glum. Miles and miles of factory buildings ring the district, spewing smoke that makes acid-gray layers in the tired sky.

"What should we do?" I ask her.

She stands up and holds her hand out to me. "Effie gave me sleeping pills. We'll see how those work. Apart from that - we keep on doing what we're doing."

* * *

The festivities in 8 are mercifully short, as apparently the travel time between 8 and 7 will take longer than our previous inter-district travel. I know nothing about 7, except that Panem's lumber and paper products are produced there, so I imagine there must be a lot of trees. Maybe it will feel a bit more like home.

Katniss heads to bed as soon as we get back on the train, but I go to the dining car and sit down at a table by a window. What is the point of even attempting to sleep? I can almost draw out exactly what my nightmares would be tonight. I'm staging my own rebellion, right here and now, against them.

A train attendant walks by and offers me warm milk, or a late-night "aperitif" - apparently, this is alcohol - but I refuse both. I will accept neither the comfort of normal sleep, nor the haze of the substance-induced. I ask instead if there is any blank paper and pencils on board.

I used to sketch on nearly a daily basis. Some days, it might amount to no more than doodles in the margins of my test papers - but even these I took pretty seriously. But ever since I came home from the Games … I do a rough sketch for the paintings, sure, but as far as working on an actual illustration, I've shied away from my old routine. Sketching is so intimate, and I've been terrified of what might come out of my pencils. It's bad enough - the process of transferring nightmares to the canvas. There are things in my head ….

I want to put down the staring, hungry faces from District 11. Or - the weather-beaten barns of District 10. Or - the withered rice fields of District 9. Something, anything, anything. But in my head, the districts are not the equivalent of their industries; they are kids - dead ones, and the living ones yet to die - their names on slips of paper, waiting this year's Reaping, and the next and the next. The kids not even born, yet, whose lives I will be plotting against as a mentor for District 12. For _years_ to come.

I look down at the piece of paper - and startle myself to see that I have already moved the pencil across it.

"How do we live with this?"

* * *

A cold, moist wind keeps slapping me on the face throughout the ceremony, throughout our speeches, in District 7. I'm tired, but less distracted, and I recite mine - and listen to Katniss' - without zoning out on what is going on.

District 7 is not much like home, but by far the nicest-looking District we've visited, so far. Set in the mountains, the air is cold and clear, and all around us are the marches of giant fir trees. After the speeches, we take a walk through the forest to check out a lumber mill. The sheer size - both in height and circumference - of the trees makes everything feel so small and petty, and our footsteps are hushed by the soft ground and the thick atmosphere of the trees - piney and dark and ancient.

"Katniss," I say, looking back at her and seeing her drag her feet. "Want a lift?"

"What?" she asks.

"Climb on my back, sleepy," I grin at her.

Everyone coos in delight when Katniss clambers up on my back and knots her hands around my neck. But I'm startled - she's a slight person, yes, but she feels way too light on my back.

We spend all too brief a time here, because it's another long trek to District 6.

"Nearly halfway done!" exclaims Effie as we board the train. "How are those pills working for you, Katniss?"

Katniss shrugs. She looks no more rested than the day before.

I'm finally too tired to avoid sleep tonight, but it doesn't last long. It's not even the nightmare, but just the dream that starts up and threatens to eventually become a nightmare that goads me awake. Then I'm restless, tossing and turning in bed. I get up, put on a robe, and leave my car again.

I'm a few cars down, when I hear it. It's muffled behind the noise of the train, but unmistakable - Katniss, crying out. I bang on her door, but the noise doesn't stop. Then I just open it and step inside. She's in bed, asleep, but thrashing around, and screaming.

"Katniss?" I run to her and then hesitate, a moment, before touching her arm.

She wakes up with a start, stares at me foggily, and then holds out her arms.

I don't even think about it. This comes naturally. I climb up into bed with her, lie down next to her, and wrap my arms around her. "It's OK, it's OK."

"It's not OK," she murmurs into my robe.

"Yeah, I know. It's not OK."

As she starts to sob, I hold on to her as if she's an escaping part of me. I'm startled by just how normal and - and - _right_ this feels. It's not just like comforting a friend, nor - I imagine - sleeping with a lover. It's like finding that piece of yourself you thought you had permanently misplaced - that part without which you have been staggering, like a lost thing - like a person with a partial limb.

I slip into sleep without even realizing that it has happened, and my dreams are made whole again. I walk through the woods and I am following her - her tread light and sure. I wake up in a cave and she is sitting over me, holding a wet cloth to my face.

 _Trust me._

In the morning, I wake up in her bed and I am not even startled to find myself there, my mouth buried in her tangled hair. She's asleep, her face in my chest. There's a knock at her door and I jump, waking her in the process. "Come in?" she says fuzzily.

"Rise and shine, superstar …."

It's her prep team - Katniss always has to prep earlier than I do. We all stare at each other, but Katniss just sits up and stretches. "I'll be out in a minute," she tells them.

When I look at her, despite her cool tone, I see that she is blushing. "Sorry - I fell asleep," I tell her. "Do you want me to talk to them?"

She shakes her head. "They won't believe you. Besides - it's what they think is happening anyway, right? Or what should be happening. It can't hurt - maybe it will get back to the Capitol, somehow."

"Oh." I start to get up. This conversation is making me all kinds of uncomfortable. And I'm all over the place in hypocrisy, because on the one hand - yes, I want them to think it; some part of me wants them all to still believe it, because I did, and it's _embarrassing_ to be the one person who was fooled. On the other hand, it's not for anyone to know, to intrude upon - this space that is more sacred than sex, by far. On the third - hand, or whatever - I don't want her to think about sex, to worry about what is in my head when I'm next to her. That's automatic, natural - and controllable. But I don't want to have to explain that, and I would bet every last cent of my Victor's winnings that she would really not want to hear the explanation.

"Peeta."

I turn to her.

"I'm sorry."

"Don't apologize," I tell her, firmly. "I slept well, at least. For the first time in a long, long while."

"Me, too."

That day, I understand the difference between real sleep and what's been passing as sleep for the last six months. I taste food again, I sense the wind and the sky - the colors and textures of the buildings - like I did before I was a tribute. It's easier, today, to see things in perspective - to feel less angry about the things I can't change, to feel less troubled about the past. I do fret a bit more about the future - but even this change is good. I can think, clear-headed, about what this will entail. I'm not less worried about it - but I am less scared.

I notice I have a sense - a feel - for the crowd. Each District is unique - how could we not be, when we are kept so isolated? - but there are some common threads. Some districts are weighed down with resignation. Some are wound up with tension. Some just hum with curiosity at the sight of us and, now that the barriers are broken - or temporarily removed, at least - Katniss and I can show more affection in front of them. I put my hand on her back and it must look as natural as it feels. She cranes her head up to give me a spontaneous kiss on the cheek and I know - that there is at least appreciation in it, if not real feeling, and this _helps_.

All through dinner in the District 6 justice building, Katniss eyes me, an expression on her face that is half question, half demand. I find myself unwilling to wait until the train to answer it, so, after a show of leading her, kissing and blushing, away from her food, I find an alcove with a coat-rack in it and hug her close to me.

"What is it?" I ask her.

"Come back to my room tonight," she whispers into my hair.

I part from her a little so I can get a good look at her face. I can see that she, too, has benefitted from the night of sleep. "Are you sure?"

She blushes. "Yeah - I don't care what anyone thinks. As long as - as long as - you don't."

"Life's too short to care what people think," I answer.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter Eight**

* * *

 _If you don't love me_  
 _Love whom you please_  
 _But throw your arms round me_  
 _Give my heart ease_

 _Give my heart ease, dear_  
 _Give my heart ease_  
 _Throw your arms round me_  
 _Give my heart ease_

I blink awake and the sun is in my eyes. The train is moving steadily, making a rhythm that actually fits the song from my dream, which is still rattling around in my head. I find myself with my head practically in Katniss' lap. She's sitting up, and I'm basically using her leg as a pillow. I should apologize and remove myself from this situation and I find I can't. Anyway, Katniss is looking at me with a half smile - she doesn't seem put out.

"It's late," I say, closing my eyes again.

"Yes, it is."

"You should have got me up," I add, without enthusiasm.

"They don't need us yet, and anyway - you were smiling in your sleep."

"No, I wasn't" I argue, smiling into her leg. "That's impossible."

"Oh, yes you were. How would you know, anyway? If you were smiling or not?"

"I can feel it when I smile in my sleep. Can't you?"

She laughs and I stretch and reluctantly sit up. I wonder if I should tell her - I was dreaming about her. But I don't want to kill the mood, which is so warm and comfortable. The mood will be killed soon enough.

"Katniss," I ask her, "do you still sing?"

"'Still sing?' What do you mean?"

"Like - when we were kids. You always - seemed to know all the songs, so I guess I thought of you as always - kind of - singing."

"Oh," she glances down at her lap. "No - not really. I sang with my dad."

Shit - is there no conversation that doesn't terminate in a sad destination? "Oh," I echo her, lamely. There's not much else to say.

But she smiles, slightly. "What about you? Do you sing?"

"I can't sing."

"Everyone can sing."

"Well, OK - I mean, maybe not everyone should? Last time I even tried it - I think it's been years since I even really sang the anthem at school, just mouthed it the last couple of years ... my voice ends up cracking a few notes in."

"That's just lack of practice, not lack of voice," she says, laughing. "Your voice comes from your muscles. Those have to be maintained."

"Which muscles?" I ask her curiously.

She points to her midriff. "Here, mostly. You can feel it - when you sing."

"No kidding?"

"No kidding."

"Well," I say, doubtfully, "maybe I'll give it a try. It would be helpful to have another hobby to fill up the days."

More than anything, though, I wish I could think of a way to get _her_ to sing again. I didn't know her father, but I feel pretty sure that he wouldn't have wanted her to stop singing on his account.

But for now, I just sigh. "I should go to my own car," I say. It's less awkward, for the both of us, for Effie to _not_ hear that we were found together in the morning. But I don't move.

"Yeah, you should," says Katniss with a stern look - but she breaks out in giggles. She's in a rare mood this morning.

"I wonder how late it is? And why they haven't come to separate us, yet?"

"I think I heard something last night about how the festivities in 4 would start later, since it's a long distance from 5. Or maybe we need less prep." She looks closely at my face, her mouth twitching. "I see no stray eyebrow hairs."

I put my hand to my forehead. "Hey. That hurts, by the way. Nothing to joke about."

She pfffts. "You're telling _me_ this? Why do they bother, anyway?" She adds, removing my hand and staring again at my eyebrows. "They're so fair, who would even see? How can eyebrows even be that light?"

I laugh. "They used to be even lighter."

"Invisible."

"Invisible, even," I agree. OK, now I really do need to leave. She's too close and I'm too comfortable. "Well, I'll see you back at beauty base zero."

I creep back down to my private car - the bed I haven't slept in in days. I go into the bathroom and start running the shower, and wonder if there is something to my brother's jokes about cold ones.

When we finally get to District 4, it turns out that we are on the edge of the world - or, at least, the edge of Panem. This District is dedicated to the fishing industry and - Effie tells us - it is enormous, stretching from a large lake in the mountains, down a two-forked river and its many streams, through hills and valleys to the coast. A series of settlements and villages make up the District, but there is also a very large city overlooking a huge bay. This is where the justice building is for the first of the Career districts.

The air smells of salt and fish and it tingles with the energy of the crowd. I can tell - just by Haymitch's wary eyeballing of us before we go out to greet the audience - that there is something different, and a little dangerous, about this place. A Career district, yes, but there is anger here - I see the resentment on the faces. I remember - vaguely, something Haymitch said rather hastily about how District 4 was different from the other Career Districts - a little less close to the Capitol than 1 and 2 - a little more independent. They let their kids train for the Games, but they aren't always to be found in the Career alliances.

I'm anxious for other reasons. Katniss is on edge, and I think this probably has a lot to do with the fact that - of the actually quite few numbers of tributes who count as her "kills," the girl from District 4 - Bet - is one of the first. She didn't target Bet, specifically (I was as much a target as any of the Careers, that night) - and it was more a defensive move than anything else … but, I know the feeling. We were just in District 5 yesterday, where I tried to forget how we lightheartedly called the red-haired girl "Foxface" all the way up until the day she stole poison berries from me and died eating them.

After the speeches, we are taken down to the bay and walk down to a beach to view the ocean. I've seen the ocean in textbooks and on TV, but there was no scale or scope to these pictures. Also, no way to imagine the tang of the air, the loud - but somehow reassuring - roar of the water. The way the water takes up the entire horizon, just like the sky. Something - exhilarating about this, escapable, I think - not really sure what I mean. Bet spoke of deep sea fishing expeditions. No Peacekeepers. No cameras. Nothing but fisherfolk together on a small boat, on the roiling waves. She spoke of it - as much as possible in the context a few whispered conversations we had in the arena - with a hint of the possibilities - the freedom of it. And now I can actually visualize it.

"I could live here," says Katniss, abruptly, moving close to me and taking my hand. "If I lived here - I think the waves would drown out - other things."

Yes. She doesn't have to explain. And perhaps nobody else but me could possibly understand.

"I wish we were going to be here at sunset," I say, regretfully. "Wouldn't you love to see the sun set over the water?"

But at sunset, we're sitting together on a loveseat inside the justice building, watching a performance of some operatic-style singing. Not quite as enchanting. I'm grateful when we get up to go for dinner - grateful that the day is almost over. But something is wrong - Katniss sees it before I do. Haymitch and Effie are in a doorway with the district mayor and some Peacekeepers, Effie gesticulating wildly. She's still speaking with energy - and some obvious anger - when Haymitch separates from the group and makes a beeline to us.

"To the train," he says between clenched teeth, heading off our questions.

Outside the justice building, we're hustled into a car and Haymitch murmurs complaints under his breath while we wait for Effie to join us. And in the distance we can hear - some chanting sound, or something. Like a large group of people calling out a single phrase, over and over. Katniss' eyes are wide, listening to it. And I feel like mine are, too.

"Don't worry," Effie says, breathlessly, when at last she joins us. "You'll get dinner on the train."

This is what Effie thinks we care about. Katniss opens her mouth, but Haymitch silences her with a quick glance.

Katniss falls asleep pretty quickly that night, but it takes me somewhat longer. So - what happens if we can't contain the districts, if we can't suppress uprisings? As grueling as this tour is, I'm starting to dread coming to the end and finding out what happens on the other side.

The distance between Districts 4 and 3 is quite long, so the train speeds up in the night and we are going at full pace when we wake up in the morning. Effie is still outraged at our abrupt departure the night before. It's almost to the point where I'm a little worried about her mental state. She seems fixated in an unhealthy way. It's either that or she's trying to distract us from what's really going on. Either way - she puts me on edge today.

When the train slows - then stops - as we are in the middle of lunch, Effie is again livid, because apparently we are way ahead of time. I look out the window and see - nothing. We are on the wide, flat empty plain that makes up so much of the uninhabited midsection of Panem. Haymitch gets up abruptly and calls for me and Katniss to follow him out of the dining car, and we pass one of the Capitol attendants, who tells Effie that "protestors are being removed from the tracks" before Haymitch can quite get us out of the room.

We sit in silence with Haymitch in the lounge car, throwing each other the occasional anxious glance, but following his lead by not talking about it - or anything. Then, eventually, he sighs and slouches in his seat, as if exhausted by the effort of caring. "At least we won't have this kind of trouble in 1 or 2," he says, at last.

That night, Katniss says: "We have to get out of it."

I'm helpless to think of an adequate response. The Career Districts of 1 and 2. These are the districts with the closest relationships to the Capitol - and between them provide the majority of the winners to the Games. I try to imagine facing the outraged families of the tributes whose group I joined only to betray … three out of the four of them were killed by Katniss herself. There is no way to avoid these confrontations … we can only count our blessings that participation in the Victory Tour can only happen once.

"Just two more days," I murmur, "and we're done. Just three more days and we'll be on the way home."

She wiggles around in my arms and I watch her squirm in misery. Home. And the end of _this_ \- the good of it and the bad. (And even the bad is not _bad_ \- just difficult.) What Effie and the rest of the people from the Capitol think, I know Katniss doesn't care. It won't be like that at home. And I - who have only been loved in these fictional places: on stage, in the arena, on the train - will go back to my real self, alone and … well, alone. Perhaps something has happened between us here that cannot be undone - certainly, we will not go back to silence and avoidance. So, then - what?

Both appearances in 2 and 1 are unbearable. No, there is no sign of a simmering populace, no scent of a rebellion. Instead, there is stony-faced resentment and barely-disguised contempt. Almost as the citizens of the Capitol do, the well-fed people of these districts clearly think of District 12 as crude and backward; our win rigged by the Capitol to appeal to bettors; our love story silly and a little grotesque.

Both districts are mountain districts, and they are said to be near the Capitol, so I consider that we might be within the same mountain range. In fact, the trip from 1 to the Capitol takes just a few hours, and we alight from the train in the dark of night, with just a few devoted fans to greet us as we transfer from the train to a car that drives us back to the Training Center.

Without even discussing it, we continue our routine and I follow her into her bedroom. Finally, leaning her head on my arm and sighing, she expresses the thought that has been on both of our minds since District 4:

"Do you think - we possibly did what President Snow asked? How can we tell?"

I bite my lip on comfort, and go for honesty. "What - quell a rebellion with our teenage romance melodrama? Depends on what started it in the first place, doesn't it?"

And it depends, I realize later, as I try hard to sleep - my wakefulness a heady cocktail of anxiety, anticipation and lust - it depends on whether or not Snow will tell her the truth or what he thinks he needs to tell her, in order to control her. So - what she knows and how and when she knows it will be entirely a matter of interpretation.

It's on this gloomy thought that I go into breakfast the next morning. My appetite has not returned, and anyway, the food has no more allure for me - I'm too used to it. I get coffee and take it out to the balcony, and watch the sun rise over the Capitol, which is sleepy in the early morning. After a while, there's a stir behind me, and Katniss is there.

"Peeta, I've been thinking …."

She pauses and bites her lip. I look at her expectantly, hollowly.

"I think we should get married."


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter Nine**

* * *

Well. I must admit that I was not expecting that.

"What?"

"A marriage proposal - tonight, at our interview. It might help solidify - our story."

"Let's talk to Haymitch about this," I frown, swallowing away the sense of let-down.

We go inside and find Haymitch with coffee in one hand and his flask in the other. Katniss repeats her suggestion and I expect Haymitch to shoot it down, but, instead, he nods slowly. I sit down abruptly at the table.

"Do you think," I ask, slowly, hating that I'm being put in the position of arguing against this plan, "that that will really convince the people who don't believe us? A marriage can be just as fake as anything else."

"True, but it offers an opportunity for a distraction - on a silver platter. The wedding of the year. And also - it might put a pause on any rebellious souls using Katniss as an inspiration. If she's so obedient to the Capitol's plans that she'll marry whomever they want …."

"Haymitch," says Katniss, gently.

"No, no - he's right," I say. "Obviously, no one would deliberately marry me of their own accord."

"Peeta," she says.

"Don't start, boy," says Haymitch. "This is serious."

"Anyway, that's not what I meant," says Katniss. "You know it's going to happen, anyway. It might as well be now, when we can …."

"Use it to our advantage?" I finish for her, painfully. "What do you mean - it's going to happen anyway?" I add, swallowing.

Haymitch groans. "Peeta, come on."

I put my head in my hands. "How did this happen?"

They both know it's a rhetorical question, so there is no reply. Images flash before my eyes, years and years of train trips to the Capitol, she and I locked together by the relationship the Capitol finds so endearing. Even if we stave off a rebellion, the Capitol will never let us go. So, yes, they will expect us to eventually get married.

"Sure," I say. Then I go back to bed, in my own room, and think stubbornly of anything I can that isn't Katniss or Haymitch.

Later that afternoon, Portia dresses me with an unusual solemnity. I'm in gray trousers with suspenders and a matching jacket. I look like I could be Mayor Undersee, just a bit younger. For a final touch, Portia adds a plain ring. This is for me to give to Katniss when she accepts my proposal. When I come out, I find Katniss dressed in a plain cotton dress, grayish-blue, with puffy sleeves and a knee-length skirt. Her mockingjay pin is conspicuously absent. Her hair is swept up and she wears a long, gold necklace. We look like relatively well-off citizens of District 12 - not fancy, Capitol-sponsored Victors.

"You look good," she says, unexpectedly.

"That's Portia's doing," I reply, somewhat mischievously.

She gives me a smile.

"Do we need to work on a speech?" asks Haymitch.

I shake my head. A proposal speech – from Haymitch? Not in a hundred years. "In my sleep, I could do this." When Katniss' smile starts to fade, I shrug. "Well - we all know it's true."

And that is how I've decided to approach this. I'll never enjoy the privilege of doing it for real, so I'm just going to pretend for a second that it is - all of it, me and her, falling in love in the Games, united in the Tour, planning to spend our lives together. So, when Caesar Flickerman - a twinkly contrast to us in his flashing suit and his blue wig and eyebrows and lips - asks us what our future plans are, I slide off my seat and kneel down in front of Katniss'. I have to wait for the gasps and screams and cheers from the crowd to die down, and in the meanwhile, I look up at Katniss, who has a passable expression of surprise on her face.

"Katniss, I used to believe that I was in love with you. But that was before I even knew you. Now that I know you, now that I know how amazing, how kind, how brave you are - I realize that I didn't even know what being in love even meant. I do know that I'm not worthy of you, but if you'll have me, you would make me the happiest person in the world - if you would marry me." I take off my ring and hold it out to her. She accepts it, chokes out a yes, and slips it onto her finger, where it is endearingly too big. That's what the necklace is for. After we accept the thunderous applause of our adoring crowd - including cheering crowds on video screen from the districts (I wonder uneasily about the reactions of a handful of people from District 12) - Katniss slips the ring onto the necklace. It all looks reasonably unscripted.

In the midst of all this, President Snow himself walks out onto the stage. He is a small man, with papery white skin and hair that is even whiter. He walks right for me, and for a second I feel just what I did when we were crowned winners of the Games - like there is one too many of us here on stage and Snow himself would dispatch one of us - probably me. But he merely claps me on the back, as if I was his favorite nephew, and congratulates me. Then he goes in for Katniss, giving her a kiss on the cheek. I watch anxiously for her expression when he releases her. Will she know, now, his critique of our performance? It's hard to say - her face is unreadable at first, when they are separated. There's a smile plastered to it, but it's a mask.

Snow takes a microphone from Caesar and addresses the crowd - "What do you think about us throwing them a wedding right here in the Capitol?"

The crowd, of course, goes wild, and Katniss grins and waves at them, even blows a few kisses. I automatically look around for Haymitch, to get some kind of cue, but I can't find him.

"Do you have a date in mind?" Caesar asks the President.

"Oh," he says slowly, "before we set a date, we better clear it with Katniss' mother." The crowd loves this and Snow puts his arm around Katniss. "Maybe if the whole country puts its mind to it, we can get you married before you're thirty."

"You'll probably have to pass a new law," she says, giggling.

"If that's what it takes."

Then, she and I are linked up again as we walk from the stage to the President's Mansion, which is behind it. There, we're hustled into a side room to change into our party clothes - me in a soft, black silk suit, Katniss in a skin-tight white gown that sparkles everywhere. The party is tremendous. Musicians are suspended from the ceiling so that the notes of their stringed instruments float down over our heads. Seats are arranged in comfortable groupings of four or five around fire pits and water features. Tables of food - fifteen or so long tables absolutely stuffed with food - fill out the center of the room. Dancing is off to the side.

Katniss grabs my hand and with a nearly-maniacal smile says, "I want to taste everything in the room."

I try to catch and hold her eye, but she only smiles at me. "Then you'd better pace yourself," I say at last, having learned nothing.

"OK, no more than one bite of each dish." We walk down a table of soups and Katniss resists temptation to break her vow at every bite - pumpkin soup, cucumber soup, lobster, tomato, raspberry. I follow behind her. My appetite has not returned, even if hers has, so I do the conversing, because Katniss has no patience for the people who come up to us, interrupting her from her eating. And I nibble on her leftovers, which, by the time we get midway through the tables, has started filling me up, anyway.

We run into her prep team there and they are drinking and laughing together - having the times of their lives. Mine is around here somewhere, too - eager and excited to join the important party, for once.

"Why aren't you eating?" asks one of the preps.

"I have been, but I can't hold another bite," says Katniss.

They laugh at her. "No one lets that stop them!" We're shepherded over to a small side table that holds tiny glass goblets filled with clear liquid. "Drink this!"

I pick up a glass, to examine it, and everyone freaks out. "Not here!"

"You have to do it there," says another prep, pointing toward the hallway where the bathrooms are. "Or you'll get it all over the floor!"

I blink a couple of times at the glass in my hand, thinking, what on earth ….? Then, I realize: "You mean - this will make me puke?"

"Of course! So you can keep eating! I've been in there twice already. Everyone does it, or how else would you have any fun at a feast?"

I gape at the glass in my hand. What the hell? There's enough food here to throw a feast for all of District 12. Where people are starving to death. And I'm expected to make room to fill up twice, maybe more. I set the glass back down on the table, still staring at it. "Come on Katniss," I say fuzzily, "let's dance."

The manic fire has gone out of her face for the moment, and she follows me to the side of the room where we can dance. This is some of that easy, slow dancing we've done before. But I can barely register her palm and her hip, where my hands are, as bile comes up. I almost don't need one of those little drinks. "You go along," I say, swallowing painfully, "thinking you can deal with it, thinking maybe they're not so bad, and then you -."

"Peeta," she whispers, "they bring us here to fight to the death for their entertainment. This is nothing by comparison."

Yes, that's true - but the Hunger Games are so pervasive, so set in stone, that I'd basically got used to them. This is excess and thoughtlessness at the most basic level. "I know. I know that. It's just sometimes I can't stand it anymore. To the point where … I'm not sure what I'll do." I frown, thinking of the people who are so much braver than we are - the old man in 11, the crowd in 4, the protesters in 3. "Maybe we were wrong, Katniss."

"About what?"

"About trying to subdue things in the districts."

She jumps, then looks anxiously from side to side, in case I've been overheard. I feel her hand tighten on my shoulder.

"Sorry," I say.

"Save it for home," she says through clenched teeth.

Portia materializes out of nowhere, in company with an older man. He's dressed in a dark purple suit, but otherwise there's not much Capitol about him - no particular body enhancements - except perhaps in his easy expression. Katniss and I stop dancing and look at him expectantly.

"Katniss, Peeta - this is Plutarch Heavensbee, the new Head Gamemaker."

Katniss stiffens next to me, and it's all I can do to manage a polite 'hello.'

"Mr. Mellark," says the man, "would you mind if I steal Miss Everdeen for a dance?"

"Certainly," I say. "Just don't get too attached."

"I wouldn't dream of breaking up Panem's happiest couple."

Eh. I step off the dance floor and watch them for a minute - Plutarch Heavensbee seems to be talking to her very earnestly, and I feel sorry that she has to handle it alone, but what can you do? I wander over to the dessert table and look over the fancy cakes and pastries. The techniques are sophisticated - foam made of sugar, icing carved into intricate patterns. For a little while, I forget everything but these cakes - Katniss, rebellions, presidents all fade to the background - while I try to memorize them for practice later. I think of Portia and art school and of all the amazing things the Capitol could be - _is,_ for the lucky people who are born here.

Lucky? I catch a glimpse of the prep teams, mingling together again, laughing and drinking. The thing about misery - real misery - is that it deepens the other aspects of life - at least, it can. Like using shadows in a painting to draw out the light. Would joy feel as keen without the shadow of misery? Would hope? Would love? What real benefit do these people get? - their lives filled with food and drink, clothes and accessories; raised to root for the bloody deaths of children in sport, so that there seems to be nothing - nothing beneath the surface of them. Except for a few - like Portia ... and how hard her life must be, I think, suddenly, constantly guarding her true feelings, here in the heart of it all.

Portia herself joins me, interrupting my thoughts, and she's brought more people with her. She introduces some of the pastry chefs and we all have a conversation about frosting techniques. My jokes about learning camouflage through frosting are one of the things I'm most famous for, and these silly people confuse my celebrity for real expertise and seem flattered by my praise of them. A year ago, they wouldn't have looked me in the eye. In the middle of this, Katniss comes back to me and grabs my arm. It's rare for us to be separated at these events.

"By any chance, can I take some of these home - to study them?" I ask, and am surprised that my request is greeted with enthusiastic acquiescence. While cakes are being boxed up, Katniss leans her head against my arm. She looks tired and I feel it, suddenly. "Effie says we have to be at the train at 1," I say. "I wonder what time it is."

"Almost midnight," Katniss replies, reaching forward to pick a chocolate rose off of one of the cakes.

As if on cue, Effie appears and touches both of us on our shoulders. We join Portia and Cinna and make a last circuit of the room, greeting and thanking some particular individuals. Some of them look familiar, and I think they were sponsors from last year, who we met at the coronation dinner. I don't like their possessive looks, how free they feel to touch us. But, soon enough, we are headed for the door.

"Should we thank President Snow?" I ask Effie, worried that we are rushing out without acknowledging the most important of the VIPs. "It's his house."

"Oh, he's not a big one for parties. I've already arranged the necessary notes and gifts to be sent to him tomorrow."

We collect Haymitch from two attendants, who are supporting him between them, that's how gone he is in his inebriation. On the way back to the train station, our car is overwhelmed by his fumes. But it's too cold to crack open any windows.

On the train, the rest of us - Katniss and I, Effie, Cinna and Portia - drink mint tea while Effie pulls out her omnipresent schedule. I know that, technically, we're still on the Victory Tour, but that just means a reception in the Justice Building tomorrow and the Harvest Festival the day after that. It feels like it's all over and I can relax again, free of my obligation to pretend to pretend to be in love with this girl who is now my pretend fiancée. But I also know my time with Katniss - my intimate time - is over. It's been bizarre and stressful and dizzying and delicious. Not that we will be ignoring each other this time, when we get home. I know we've crossed that line.

Friends.

I go to her room after she's asleep and watch her for a bit, while I hesitate. I don't know if she'd mind it, or not, but I've never been denied, and it's the very last night. I'm so tired that I know her proximity won't make it difficult to sleep, as it often does. I tuck myself in on one side of the bed, away from her, and fall asleep.

When I wake, it seems late, but the train is still chugging along. Sometime in the night, we moved together and I wake up with my mouth in her hair, with her head on my arm. I find myself wondering if this marriage we have cooked up will actually really take place. And what it would be like, to be married to someone who has been forced into it. It sounds pretty tedious, but at least I wouldn't be living alone. If I could just completely detach myself - if I could really just be her friend, maybe it would even be bearable. I guess ... one day we'll have to sit down and figure all of that out.

She stirs and looks up at me.

"No nightmares," I say.

"What?"

"You didn't have any nightmares last night."

She looks thoughtful. "I had a dream, though. I was following a mockingjay through the woods, for a long time. It was Rue, really. I mean, when it sang, it had her voice."

"Where did she take you?"

"I don't know. We never arrived. But I felt happy."

"Well, you slept like you were happy."

She squints at me. "How come I never know when you're having a nightmare?"

"I don't know. I don't think I cry out or thrash around or anything. I just come to - paralyzed with terror."

"You should wake me."

I shake my head, slightly. "Not necessary. My nightmares are usually about losing you. I'm OK once I realize you're here."

She looks stricken by this, guilty. But she knows how I feel, so there's really no reason to hide any of it, anymore. I've got much more pressing, more stressful things to worry about.

"Be worse when we're home and I'm sleeping alone again," I add, not stopping to think of the implications of the words. But it doesn't matter - I see it in her eyes again, and now I recognize it. That look of home that comes on her face during the last leg of the train journey. She doesn't know what to do with me there, how to incorporate me there.

But I refuse to be discouraged. And, because it's the last day I'll really have the privilege, I take the opportunity give her a light kiss on the forehead and to settle back into sleep next to her - where the nightmares can't find me.


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter Ten**

* * *

"I really do think we should have a party - or something."

I don't want to be a bad host, but it's at this point of the afternoon that I start to consider asking everyone to go home. As it is, I'm lying on my couch, stroking the nerveless length of my prosthesis, while Delly, Lily and Aster finish up the coffee and cheesecake I laid out for them.

"I think the Capitol is going to be in charge of that," I say wearily.

"But," says Delly, confused. "But what about your family and Katniss' family - and everyone here? None of us have ever really met Katniss."

"What are you talking about?" I say, sitting up. "You went to school with her for ten years."

"What are _you_ talking about?" she counters. "So did you and you never even spoke to her until last year. I didn't even know Gale Hawthorne was her cousin."

"Mmm," I reply shortly. That's a fiction that was devised by the Everdeens and Hawthornes last year, when Katniss and I were in the Games. Camera crews came to interview our friends and family, and, in light of the romance strategy, some more innocent cover story was needed to account for Gale. The funny thing about that is - I always used to think they _were_ cousins. But it was just wishful thinking ...

"Peeta," says Lily. "Why aren't you _happier_?"

I open my mouth to answer that question, then realize just how vast it is. Happiness has been buried under a pile of misery so enormous, I'll be picking through it for years. To the pre-existing conditions of haunting memories of the Games and unrequited love has been added the weight of Panem's listless and angry and despairing populations, and Snow's still-unresolved threat hanging over us, and the wedding, and the upcoming Quell. But I finally just say, "I'm sorry - I don't mean to seem unhappy. I'm still just so exhausted from the tour."

"It looked fun," says Delly.

"Yeah, but -." I bite my lip. "That's just what you saw here - a condensed version of our days; what, maybe an hour or so a day? What you see on TV - all kind of boiled down and stuff - is only a small percentage of what goes on, and it's only what they think the audience wants to see. Just imagine, being on a train all day and all night except for a couple of hours in a different district – for weeks. It's - exhausting."

"Uh, Peeta, we've never even been on a train," says Aster. "How are we supposed to imagine it? You've seen the ocean. You've been to the mountains. You've seen the Capitol. We don't envy you the Games, but - we're stuck here."

"I love District 12," I say. "I missed it." I can't tell them about the rest of it - about how no one anywhere is happy, not even the people in the Capitol who think they are.

The girls leave shortly after, and Delly is the last to go. I hold the door open as she steps out onto my porch.

"We have to do something to celebrate your engagement," she insists again.

"Delly - why didn't the guys come?"

Delly - who always looks cheerful, no matter what - drops her eyes. "I tried, Peeta. It's just … they're still - you know - kids. You're different now."

I clutch my door. "I know. But that doesn't mean I don't get lonely."

"So, we girls aren't good enough for you?"

"I didn't say that. Thanks, Delly. For looking out for me."

As she walks through the patches of snow, back towards town, I'm left to think about all the changes in my life.

I haven't been lonely since the tour ended a week ago. Now, when I stop off at Katniss' house in the morning with bread, I'll usually stay for breakfast. Katniss' mom fascinates me - how quiet and nervous she is in comparison to her older daughter. How pretty she must have been at 16, when my father was in love with her. And I like hanging out with Prim, who unlike mother and sister has a naturally optimistic personality. It's not that we talk about it - the engagement - but I think Prim actually approves of me. Even though Gale's been a friend for years. It's strange.

I get my coat on and head out myself. I've just reached the gate when Katniss comes into view, walking home. She's wearing her leather jacket and boots and when she sees me, she quickens her pace to meet up with me.

"Been hunting?" I ask her, trying to sound neutral about it.

"Not really. Going to town?"

"Yes. I'm supposed to eat dinner with my family."

"Oh, well, I can at least walk you in," she says.

I glance at her as she falls in next to me. She looks agitated. But she doesn't say anything until

we are almost back in town.

"Peeta, if I asked you to run away from the district with me, would you?

I stop abruptly and take her arm, so she has to stop, too. We face each other for a moment and I can tell that something has gone horribly wrong. "Depends on why you're asking," I reply.

Her response tumbles out, softly but urgently. "President Snow wasn't convinced by me. There's an uprising in District 8. We have to get out."

I don't ask how she knows this, or when she found out. I just know by her voice that it's true. "By 'we' do you mean just you and me? No. Who else would be going?"

"My family. Yours, if they want to come. Haymitch, maybe."

Whoever she thinks will be punished if we flee. I feel a chill that has nothing to do with the weather. "What about Gale?" I ask.

"I don't know. He might have other plans."

By this I can tell that she has already asked Gale - probably just now, in the woods. And he said no. No, he doesn't strike me as one to run away from trouble, especially if he knew her plans included me. But then, he hasn't really seen what we've seen. Katniss is right, though. If she goes, he needs to go, too, every bit as much as me. If there really are punishments to be handed out. But I can't worry about Gale on top of everything else. "I bet he does," I say. "Sure, Katniss, I'll go."

Her face relaxes. "You will?"

Damn it. Of course, of _course_. She has to know that I'd do just about anything she asked. But loyalty is a two-way street with her. And Gale's is the longer alliance. She'd never leave him behind. "Yeah," I say, gently squeezing her arm. "But I don't think for a minute you will."

This angers her. She jerks away from me. "Then you don't know me. Be ready. It could be any time." She takes off again and I follow her more slowly, surprised by the intensity of her response.

"Katniss. Katniss, hold up!"

She stops and waits for me, kicking at the ground.

"I really will go, if you want me to. I just think we better talk it through with Haymitch. Make sure we won't be making things worse for everyone." Haymitch will assuredly be hard to convince. But it would be poor play to repay his extraordinary effort for us with abandonment to the Capitol.

As I'm thinking about Haymitch, I hear a sound that chills me with its long familiarity. The snap of leather meeting flesh. It's faint, but distinct, and coming from the direction of town. "What's that?"

Katniss looks puzzled and just shakes her head.

"Come on," I say, grabbing her hand and hurrying her on to the town square. A crowd has gathered there, along the edges, as if it's Reaping Day, and I can't see what's going on. I finally find an empty crate against one of the shop walls and jump on top of it. I offer a hand up to Katniss, then stop when I finally see what's happening in the square, and push her back down. "Get down! Get out of here!"

There's another crack of leather as the whip whistles in the air. Another hiss as it meets flesh. I don't know why this is happening, but it's completely real. Gale is tied to a post in the square, slumped all the way down, his bare back laced with bloody stripes, while a Peacekeeper stands over him with a whip.

"Go home!" I tell Katniss. "I'll be there in a minute, I swear!"

But she doesn't listen to me; she darts through the crowd until she stands in the front of it. I can see her, in that moment, trying to take everything in, to understand what is going on. Then, with a cry, she springs forward to put herself between Gale and the whip, and takes a lash herself.

Blood rushes to my head and I jump down off of the crate and fight my own way through the crowd. I'm far more awkward than Katniss is, and people are trying to hold me back, but I finally stumble my way into the square and see Haymitch approaching from the other side, probably coming from the Hob.

"Stop it!" cries Katniss. "You'll kill him!"

A gun is pulled on her and I lurch forward, frantically. Haymitch trips over someone already lying on the ground. "Hold it!" he shouts.

He and I reach Katniss around the same time, but his eyes command me to freeze. He catches his breath and pulls Katniss to her feet, all the while looking straight at this Peacekeeper who I've never seen before. "Oh, excellent," Haymitch says, sarcastically. I can feel the crowd around us watch in fascinated horror, holding its collective breath. "She's got a photo shoot next week modeling wedding dresses. What am I supposed to tell her stylist?"

I glance beyond him to the Peacekeeper lying on the ground. It's Darius, one of the younger and more friendly of the lot. I venture a close look at this new, unfamiliar Peacekeeper and realize that he is wearing the uniform of a Head Peacekeeper, but he's not Cray, who's been the Head here for as long as I can remember. He's lean and hard muscled and his eyes are cold. "She interrupted the punishment of a confessed criminal," he says in a voice that somehow carries throughout the square despite his clenched jaw.

Haymitch is neither impressed nor intimidated. "I don't care if she blew up the blasted Justice Building! Look at her cheek! Think that will be camera-ready in a week?"

I have to admire Haymitch's quick thinking, because, behind the absurdity of the whole thing, he's using our only possible defense. Katniss belongs to the Capitol, now; she's not under this guy's jurisdiction.

"That's not my problem," says the Peacekeeper, but in a less strident tone.

"No? Well it's about to be," says Haymitch, doubling down. "The first call I make when I get home is to the Capitol. Find out who authorized you to mess up my victor's pretty little face!"

"He was poaching. What business is it of hers, anyway?"

Katniss stirs, but I grab her arm. "He's her cousin," I say quickly. "And she's my fiancée. So, if you want to get to him, expect to go through both of us."

Haymitch glances at me unhappily, but I will not - I will not - let him leave me out again. Whatever happens, I'm a victor, and I have to stand with them. It doesn't matter that my winning was unintentional, and that my survival was catastrophic. This is the only identity I have left.

The Head Peacekeeper looks at me for a second, in recognition, then turns to the line of Peacekeepers that stand behind him. These are familiar faces, and unhappy. One of them steps forward, suddenly. "I believe, for a first offense, the required number of lashes has been dispensed, sir. Unless your sentence is death, which we would carry out by firing squad."

"Is that the standard protocol here?"

The assembled Peacekeepers confirm it with ragged nods of assent. For a moment, the situation could go either way, then the new Head barks at us to take Gale away. He wipes the length of the whip with his gloved hands and we are spattered by Gale's blood.

There's a collective hum as he turns his back and walks toward the Justice Building. Most of the audience scurries away. There's no time for us to relax. We all know we have to get out of that square just as soon as possible. I find someone with a knife, Haymitch finds a board for sale and while Katniss stands, dazed, with the cut on her face swelling and bleeding, we cut Gale down and place him carefully on the board. I'm reminded forcibly of Cato's mangled body. I had hoped never to see things like this again, out of the arena. A couple of guys - miners around Gale's age - step forward to help Haymitch and I carry him. As we lift him, I glance back at the girl.

"Come on, Katniss!" I hiss at her, when she stands, still dazed, like when she was stung by tracker jackers. She jumps back to life, and at that moment, one of her friends from the Seam grabs her arm. "Need help?"

"No, but can you get Hazelle? Send her over to my house. Don't let her bring the kids!"

"Get some snow on that," Haymitch tells her.

After we leave the town and are back on the empty road to Victors' Village, Haymitch asks one of the miners, "What happened?"

"As best we can tell, he went to sell a turkey he got to Cray. But he found this new guy - Romulus Thread is his name. No one knows what happened to Cray."

"I saw him this morning in the Hob," says Haymitch grimly.

"Anyway, Thread had him taken to the square immediately, made him confess to poaching at gun point and ordered the whipping. I think he got in at least forty lashes."

"Lucky he only had the one turkey on him. If he'd had his usual haul, would've been much worse."

"He told Thread he found it wandering around the Seam, as if it got over the fence and he'd stabbed it with a stick. Still a crime, but if they'd known he'd been in the woods with weapons, they'd have killed him for sure."

"What about Darius?" I ask.

"He stepped in after about twenty lashes, saying that was enough. Only he didn't do it smart and official, like Purnia. He grabbed Thread's arm and got hit in the head with the butt of the whip. Nothing good waiting for him."

"Doesn't sound like much good for any of us," says Haymitch ominously.

It begins to snow, adding to the overall misery. I wonder if this is it, the beginning of the crackdown. Who will they start with, to punish Katniss? Gale, probably, he's put himself out there. Me? My family?

We get to Katniss' house and I get to see them in action, for the first time. Katniss has spoken with awe of her mother and sister's work as healers. Her mother comes to life, takes command of all of us. We lay Gale on the table, Prim is sent for the medications. She crumbles herbs and adds droplets of liquid from small bottles into a basin of boiling water. Cloths are soaked in the water, then she approaches her patient, thoughtfully, dispassionately.

"Did it cut your eye?" she asks Katniss, suddenly, as if she can take in all of the room at once.

"No, it's just swelled shut."

I look at her, concerned. It's ugly, purple and swollen. I'm not sure she would be honest in this moment, but I can't even see her eye to tell if it's injured.

"Get more snow on it."

"Can you save him?" she asks, and there is the ghost of a howl in her voice, though it comes out as a whimper.

"Don't worry." It's Haymitch who responds. "Used to be a lot of whipping before Cray. She's the one we took them to."

I glance between him and Katniss' mother. In light of the current crisis - and, yes, a little because I'm sixteen years old and rarely think about such things - it's hard to remember that these troubles have always existed, will always exist, long after we all are gone. I sigh, grab a clean dish towel and go outside for snow. Of which there is an abundance, it is coming down so thickly now. I pack a ball of it into the towel, go back inside, and do what I do - look after Katniss. She's unresisting as I lead her to one of the chairs pushed back from the table, set her down and put the snow to her face. She feels about as far from me as she ever has and I just try to ignore this - push it down, push it down.

Haymitch is in one of his sober moods that pop up unexpectedly - taking everything in with his clever eyes. Thoughts are churning through his head. He dismisses the two miners who came with us with money, saying he's not sure about what will happen to their team. Gale's mother shows up and she wordlessly, soundlessly, pulls a stool up to the table, and takes his hand. Katniss' mother works around her, cleaning the wounds with her herbal concoction, arranging the tattered skin, applying a salve and then wrapping bandages.

By the time the bandaging is almost done, Gale finally starts to pull out of unconsciousness. I know how horrible it is to wake up out of sleep into blinding pain and even I feel for him a bit. Katniss stiffens at the sound of his moans.

"He's waking up," Katniss' mother says, turning to Prim, "so let's make him something he can drink, for the pain."

"That won't be enough," says Katniss suddenly. "That won't be enough. I know how it feels. That will barely knock out a headache."

"We'll combine it with sleep syrup, Katniss, and he'll manage it. The herbs are more for inflammation…."

"Just give him the medicine!" she screams. "Give it to him! Who are you, anyway, to decide how much pain he can stand!"

Gale begins to stir and moan even more.

"Take her out."

Katniss thrashes and screams in protest as Haymitch and I grab her by the arms and start hauling her away. I've never heard the words before - not from her mouth - that she uses to curse her mother. We take her to the downstairs bedroom and hold her there, on the bed, until she stops fighting and collapses, her face wet with her tears. Even then, we know better than to trust her acquiescence, and keep her pinned down.

I find it hard to look at her, so I glance over at Haymitch, and see just how gray his face is.

"Haymitch, I'm worried," I whisper.

He glances at me and his eyes are sad.

"Just before this happened, she told me that Snow wasn't convinced by us, that there's already an uprising in district 8. She wants us all to run."

Haymitch raises his eyebrows, then shrugs. Whatever he thinks about this, he won't discuss it.

Eventually, Katniss' mother comes in to treat her, and we both straighten up. I look at Katniss now, see the raw despair on her face. Her mother applies some of that herbal ointment and salve to her cut. Then she just holds her hand and strokes her arm, while Haymitch tells her what happened in the square.

"So, it's starting again?" she says. "Like before?"

"By the looks of it," he answers, and I deflate. Half of me hoped that Haymitch would dismiss this all as a fluke - a simple matter of District discipline that got out of hand. If even he can't sugarcoat this, it must be bad. "Who'd have thought we'd ever be sorry to see old Cray go?"

That echoes something that I had contemplated during the tour, where I saw the clear signs that some districts were guarded with a far more heavy hand than District 12. Our mayor is a gentle non-entity. Our Head Peacekeeper, Cray, didn't have the taste for punishment. He had a taste for alcohol, for the young and desperate district girls, for fresh game - no matter where it came from. But not for enforcing the laws against the criminal activities – such as poaching – that benefited him as much as anyone.

The doorbell rings and we all jump. Katniss leaps from her bed. "They can't have him."

"Might be you they're after," says Haymitch, with a touch of wryness back in his voice.

"Or you," she retorts.

"Not my house. But I'll get the door."

"No, I'll get it," says Katniss' mother.

We all go together, following her down the hallway, holding breath while she answers the door. It's almost more of a shock to see, not a Peacekeeper, but a young woman - Madge Undersee, the mayor's daughter, with a green cloak flung carelessly over her head. She finds Katniss and pulls a small box out to hand to her. "Use these for your friend. They're my mother's. She said I could take them. Use them, please." And she turns and runs back out into the storm.

"Crazy girl," says Haymitch.

Back in the kitchen, Katniss mutely hands the damp box to her mother; it is filled with small vials of clear liquid. She fills a syringe with the contents of one of the vials, then injects it into Gale's arm. I know that Katniss and Madge are friends, but that in itself doesn't seem to explain what is going on.

"What is that stuff?" I ask.

"It's from the Capitol. It's called morphling."

Gale's face, which had been shiny, sweaty and knotted in pain, relaxes at once.

"I didn't even know Madge knew Gale," I say out loud. I look to Katniss for confirmation, and there's a strange, possessive look on her face.

"We used to sell her strawberries," she says shortly.

"She must have quite a taste for them," says Haymitch, in a tone that none of us can mistake. I track back over our years at school, try to find some clue that confirms what he is saying. There were girls enough who talked about Gale, who claimed to have made out with him. Handsome, aloof, forbidden fruit - especially to the girls I hung out with - Gale had always been the subject of rumors that may or may not have been true. But Madge was every bit as much of a loner as Katniss was. If I exchanged more than a few words with her during the course of a school year, it was just because she was the mayor's kid, after all, and she didn't scowl, like Katniss - she would just nod and move on. And, also like Katniss, she just wouldn't be the sort of person to talk about stuff like that.

"She's my friend," says Katniss firmly.

Prim says, "Why doesn't everyone go into the sitting room, and I'll bring you some stew."

Haymitch, Katniss and I sit together, eating dinner. But each of us is in our own world. I'm surprised I'm not more depressed by tonight's events - seeing Katniss' affection for Gale, right out in the open in front of me - but I'm just numb. Worried and numb. I know this is a temporary salve. I dread going home tonight because there the more important things will fade away, and my heart - which has been at the bottom of the list of things to care about, ever since the Reaping - my heart will crack open again and I will forget everything I promised her, everything I promised myself - and be at the mercy of my hurt and jealousy.

Haymitch and I leave together. There is already a heavy carpet of snow on the ground and the new snow is falling in a thick curtain at a sharp angle. We're in for another good one; this endless winter. I'm not dressed for this storm, and by the time I reach my house, I'm soaked through and my hands are turning blue. With automatic motions, I stir up the fire, add more coal. In the kitchen, I see the remnants of my lunch with the girls, and I wash up, trying to even remember their faces, so much has happened in the meanwhile.

The floor is slick with the dishwater and the snow that has melted off of me, and I take an awkward step, lose my footing and slip down onto the kitchen floor. I just sit there, angry at myself, at Katniss, at Haymitch. I pull at the prosthetic leg, the remnant of that double-damned arena, and a symbol of everything that has gone wrong with my life. Unwanted, unloved - unlovable, probably. Stuck here - in this house, in this district - with formless horrors waiting in the immediate future. For all my troubles - for all the acting, for the sword I took and the jaws of the muttation - for having my heart broken on the train tracks in the middle of nowhere - for all that she curled into me in the night - for all of that, I'm going to die anyway, probably executed in the town square, just under my old bedroom window, as an example for the youth of Panem not to defy the Capitol in even the least of ways.

And as I throw the prosthesis away from myself, I just hope it comes sooner rather than later.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter Eleven**

* * *

In the morning, I wake before the sun - look outside and see there will be no sun today. There's something pointed about this storm, as if it is being manipulated by the Gamemakers. We're in crisis - a new Head Peacekeeper has arrived and has a heavy hand. Katniss thinks we need to flee the district, sooner rather than later, to escape a terrible end. And here is this late-winter storm, when we should be getting the soft warm rains that tease out the spring wildflowers.

I stoke the coals in the stove, then warm up the kitchen with the oven. Despite everything, there's a routine to follow. People will still expect bread.

I walk over to Haymitch's and leave his delivery in the front room. He'll be sleeping off the morning, probably. Then I go over to Katniss'. I take three deep breaths before gently going inside.

It's - about what I expected. Gale's still unconscious on the kitchen table, his bandaged back damp, but his demeanor calm. Katniss sits next to him, on the stool where his mother sat. Her head is on the table and she's asleep, but she clutches his hand in one of hers.

It's hard to see - no question. But I can't legitimately argue that I have any claim on her - not a real claim, anyway. I was silent. He spent years with her in the woods. If anything, I'm the intruder. I can almost see it - him watching the Games, dreading watching her, but unable to avoid it. Hearing some stranger declare his love for her. Did he know that her actions in the arena were motivated by survival, not love? Surely, if he knew her at all. But it must have been hard to watch. It is _so_ hard to watch.

I put the bread on the counter and gently shake her awake. She stirs and looks at me - right at me - as if she knows she is killing me and she hates it, but she can't help it. She's gray-faced and gaunt. It's uncomfortably reminiscent of the moment before the berries, when she _should_ have killed me.

"Go on up to bed, Katniss. I'll look after him now."

"Peeta," she says. "About what I said yesterday. About running -."

"I know." I shake my head. I always knew. "There's nothing to explain."

She continues to stare at me for so long that it starts to get uncomfortable, and I'm anxious about what can possibly be said as a follow-up. She is silent. But what can she say? There's _nothing_ she can say to change the fact that she's made her choice. I will go with her, but he will not - so, she's going to stand here and take whatever punishment is coming to her because nothing will force her to leave him again. I don't know where this puts our supposed engagement and wedding. I don't know what she thinks will happen in the Quarter Quell, when we will be expected to resume our performances back in the Capitol. Haymitch is going to be unhappy, but I know - I have reason to know - there's no dislodging Katniss Everdeen when she puts her mind to something. It's why I'm alive today to offer to watch over the boy she really loves.

"Peeta -." she says again. There's no happiness in her face. She has the grace to look genuinely distressed.

"Just go to bed, OK?"

I take a seat against the wall, and Prim comes in after a while, doing a double-take when she sees me there. She smiles at me as she pokes around the bandages, gently. I think about last year's Reaping, when she was a little younger, but so much smaller, much more frightened, as she took those tentative steps to the stage. Those last few moments before I myself was a tribute. That whole day retains a slanted quality in my memory, as if I can only see it at the crazy angle of a person about to collapse into a faint.

She's alive. Her sister is alive. I'm alive. An impossible situation. The odds were against it.

"How's he doing?"

"He'll be fine. We'll keep him on morphling until the danger of the worst pain has passed. Have you ever had a really bad sunburn?"

"Yeah, I burn pretty easily."

"Me, too. This summer, remind me to show you something that can prevent them. He'll feel like that for a while - like he has a really, really bad sunburn. He'll manage. He'll miss a lot of days at work, though."

I frown. "Will he - take money?"

She chuckles. "He doesn't take anything. His mother might."

"Thanks, I'll remember that," I say.

She looks me over for a while. "It's good of you to ask. I'm glad you are spending time with us now. We've been worried about you."

"What? What do you mean?"

"You don't seem to get many visitors. Um - I've been around a lot of people who have had - amputations - and sometimes they get depressed."

"Oh." I look at her curiously. "Have you ever had to …."

"I've helped, yes."

I'm flabbergasted as I look at her calm, still, smiling face. "Maybe you would have been better prepared for the arena than me," I say.

"It's different though, isn't it? What happens here - mining accidents. They're unfortunate, maybe they could be prevented better. But they're accidents. What happened to you - and the things that you saw …."

"I've been a little depressed," I admit. "My leg is - only part of it. It's everything, really. I'm always afraid that people will want me to talk about it, so it's easier to avoid them."

"Maybe you _should_ talk about it."

I smile. "You really aren't much like Katniss, are you?"

"No, not that way, I guess."

Gale stirs and we both turn to look at him, but he settles back down.

"Do you know why Madge's mother uses - morphling?"

"I guess it's for her headaches. Katniss says she gets severe headaches that last for days. That's why Madge comes over here so much. That and I'm not sure her parents would be happy that Katniss is teaching her how to hunt."

"What?"

Prim laughs. "Right? You wouldn't think it, but she asked Katniss to teach her. Katniss always wanted me to learn, but I wasn't any good at it."

I look over at Gale, thoughtfully, wondering if Haymitch had the right of it, after all.

"Peeta - you're still going to come over for breakfast, aren't you?"

"You mean …." I look over to her. I wish her sister had one-tenth her powers of perception. "Oh - I already knew how she felt about Gale. Nothing has changed, really."

"Good. You shouldn't spend too much time on your own. And we won't bug you with questions. Anyway - it's good for Katniss."

"How do you mean?"

"You - make her smile."

That hurts in a specific point in my chest, high up and sharp. It hurts in a way that doesn't make me feel sorry for myself. It makes me sorry for her - for the girl whose life has had few smiles in it, especially since her father died. Yes, I've seen her smile - I've made her smile. "Oh," I say. "Well, I don't know about that, but it is good for me."

Her mother comes into the kitchen and follows her lead, poking around the bandages. "I think we'll try snow coat later this morning," she says thoughtfully. She then looks out the kitchen window. "I don't think there will be school today, Prim."

"No, I don't think so."

"Peeta, have you eaten?"

I shake my head.

"Why don't you guys go sit in the other room. We'll just have some bread and leftover stew. Obviously, food preparation is out of the question."

"Will you be able to move him soon?"

"We'll want to do the snow coat in here, as it might make a mess. But after that, we'll move him into the spare bedroom. He should be able to go home in a couple of days."

She brings tea, the sliced loaves of bread - to which I had added orange peel and cinnamon - butter and the remainder of a beef and potato stew into the sitting room, and we eat in silence. She has a habit of looking at me - like Prim does - with a gentle look, unobtrusive but thoughtful. "You look like your father," she says, suddenly.

I blush. And Katniss looks like her own father, the man her mother chose instead of mine.

"I was surprised when you said that he had ever spoken to you - about me."

"Well, I mean - not a lot. Just once or twice."

"We were very good friends as children, and I was sorry - sorry to disappoint him. He seemed to move on quickly enough," she adds. "I was glad for that."

Well - not really. I wouldn't hold my parents' marriage up as an example of wedded bliss. But I've embarrassed them enough, already, so I don't say anything.

I feel at this point - love triangles and marriages being the topics on the table - I should bring up something about the engagement and all the kisses on the tour. But I honestly don't know what Katniss has told them, exactly, about all that. They are surely aware that there was a strategic element to the whole thing. But I just finish breakfast, then wash up the dishes. I'm supposed to be looking after Gale, but there doesn't seem much to do, not with Prim and her mother downstairs, as well.

When I hear Katniss stirring upstairs, it's mid-morning, and I slip away before she comes down.

Prim asks me if I'm sure, I might get stuck in the house if this weather lasts much longer, but I say I have plenty of supplies, and I should keep the house warm, anyway.

Outside, there's a small lull in the storm, in the sense that the wind seems to be gently swirling around in circles, as if trying to decide on a direction. But the white sky and the white ground are indistinguishable from each other, offering no promise of imminent relief. I trudge through the snow, following the tops of the little iron fences that border the front yard of each house. I slither my way up Haymitch's porch and go inside. He's still passed out. The bread is untouched. I refuel his fire, then go back out into the blizzard and make my own way home.

Since the storm looks to be a long one, I prep my house for the worst. I shut the upstairs vents to preserve my coal, and move my bedding and some clothes into the living room, piling them up on the couch. I'm tired and drained, and only got about three hours of sleep last night, so I snuggle into the pile of blankets and clothes and am just slipping away into a comfortable and effortless nap when the phone rings and jerks me awake.

Phone calls usually mean Effie or someone, calling from the Capitol. Could be Portia. Maybe they've seen a weather report and are calling to check in on me. I stagger into the study to answer the phone, and there's a beat before I hear a response.

"Hey," says Katniss. "I just wanted to make sure you got home."

I blink at the phone. "Katniss, I live three houses away from you."

"I know," she says earnestly, "but with the weather and all."

I can feel my face smile and I don't even know why. I'm sure it's just that she's feeling sorry for me, but - it's a lot better than being completely ignored, anyway. "Well, I'm fine. Thank you for checking." There's a long pause. I can still hear her breaths on the other end of the line. "How's - Gale?" I ask, as if I wasn't just over there.

"All right. My mother and Prim are giving him snow coat now."

"And your face?"

"I've got some, too. Have you seen Haymitch today?"

"I checked in on him. Dead drunk. But I built up his fire and left him some bread."

"I wanted to talk to - to both of you," she says, with her voice oddly strained.

This is curious. She is no longer planning to run into the woods. Has she come up with some other plan? I can't even begin to imagine what it is. But at least she's not leaving me out.

"Probably have to wait until the weather calms down. Nothing much will happen before that, anyway."

"No, nothing much," she agrees.

There's another pause. "Well - thanks again for calling," I finally say.

"Are you going to be OK there? I'm worried we might get blocked in, and …"

"Depends on how long the storm lasts," I reply, "but I have plenty for now. I don't know about breakfast tomorrow - we'll have to see."

"I know. I'll miss … the bread. But don't leave the house if it's dangerous."

"Same with you," I tell her.

Over the next two days, as the storm rages on, I regret more than once not staying with the Everdeens. Katniss calls in the mornings to check in, and twice on the second day. We have a long conversation that starts with our favorite things to eat in the Capitol and ends with everything we can remember about fourth grade. We're that bored.

I hear from Portia once, too. She quizzes me on wedding ceremonies in District 12. Having seen the lavish public ceremonies of Capitol celebrities, I know they are done very differently from ours. On our own ceremonies, I'm a little bit of an expert, the bakery making specialty breads for the toasting ceremony that is the core of the wedding. "Not that specialty breads are needed," I conclude. "Just that - if you can afford it - you try to get something a little nicer than normal."

Eventually, I come to understand that she's helping Cinna work on wedding dresses.

"For Katniss? How many does she need?"

"There's a bit of a - thing - about it over here," she says delicately. "Since the wedding is going to be televised, the Capitol audience is voting on venues and catering - and outfits. So - we're working on quite a few."

I force myself not to give in to a long, frustrated sigh. "I'm sorry for you guys. That sounds like a lot of work when you could be - doing other stuff."

"Well, it won't be a waste. Whatever dresses don't make the final cut, someone will want them. So, what's your preference, anyway? Lace, silk, satin, feathers, sequins, pearls?"

For a wedding that will never happen? "I … I'm not sure I have a preference. We don't really do fancy wedding dresses here, so the only ones I've seen are on TV, and I didn't really pay much attention."

"OK, but - you've seen Katniss in enough dresses over the course of the year. If you had your preference, would there be one that looked like one of those?"

I mostly remember the sleeveless dress from District 11, the one that showed off just a little too much. But I feel like I would be giving away something intimate and embarrassing by admitting to it. "I liked the orange one," I say, impulsively. Then, as a follow up, since that dress is clearly too plain for a Capitol wedding, "I liked the puffy sleeves."

"Noted," says Portia, with a laugh in her voice.

On day 3, the storm has stopped, but the drifts are so high that there is no going out of the house, at least via the front door. But I'm determined to escape into the sunlight, at least for a little while. I go upstairs to my cold bedroom, open the window, and drop down onto the snow pack, which is just a few feet below me.

The sky is as blue today as if there never were such a thing as clouds. From here, I can see the main square of District 12, where just the tops of the houses show. There's activity - people are already starting to shovel - and over in the Seam, too, where the small houses have vanished, people are starting to dig paths to find doorways. Helping each other.

I check to make sure there is still smoke rising from Haymitch's and Katniss' houses. Then, feeling so much better for having had the sun in my face, I go back inside and start baking. I'm so low on sugar now, I really have just enough to start one batch of dough, and definitely not enough to make sticky buns. But I don't want anything plain, either, so I experiment with cheese, of which I am no great fan - but I have two enormous wheels of it. Melted inside and sprinkled on top, baked crispy - it turns out a lot better than I expected.

The next morning, I wake to my ringing phone and it's Katniss. "Hey," she says, "they've cleared a path to the square. Do you want to go into town with me?"

Sure enough, the people with the shovels have cleared a narrow path to my door, and between mine, Haymitch's, and Katniss'. I warm up some of the leftover cheese buns in the oven, then head out. It's eerie, the walls of snow, taller than I am by several feet - like walking in a tunnel.

At Katniss' house everyone looks tired, but well. The fresh bread is welcomed with delight, and even more than that. Katniss - who is a pleasure to feed anyway, she likes food so much - takes two bites and then says, "Are you kidding me?" before wolfing down most of the rest of them.

"You've been holding out on us," she says to me, accusingly.

"No, I haven't!" I laugh at her. "I just had a lot of time to experiment over the last couple of days."

We go over to Haymitch's, where, predictably, the usual horrific smells have become even more pungent over the last couple of days. Still, it's clear that he's been feeding himself, as well as tending to his stove. We rouse him with no more than the usual trouble, and he agrees to come to town with us, his only complaint that we are such absurdly early birds.

We all seem to be in silent agreement that Victors' Village is not the safest place to have a conversation, so we're well away from it when Haymitch finally speaks. "So, we're all heading out into the great unknown, are we?"

"No, not anymore," she says, reacting to the sarcasm in his voice with coolness in her own.

"Worked through the flaws in that plan, did you, sweetheart? Any new ideas?"

I'm trailing behind them on the narrow path and Katniss gives a quick glance back at me. "I want to start an uprising."

Haymitch laughs. Just laughs. "Well, I want a drink," he says. "You let me know how that works out for you, though."

"Then what's your plan?"

"My plan is to make sure everything is just perfect for your wedding. I called and rescheduled the photo shoot without giving too many details."

"You don't have a phone," she says.

"Effie had that fixed. Do you know she asked me if I'd like to give you away? I told her, the sooner the better."

"Haymitch…."

"Katniss. It won't work."

Up above us on the path, three men with shovels are heading toward us, and Katniss and Haymitch stop talking. After they pass us, we have reached the square, which is considerably more shoveled in than the rest of town, and this allows us to see all the changes that have somehow been made since the storm started three days ago. A new banner on the Justice Hall. Peacekeepers stationed around the square. Peacekeepers on the rooftops, with machine guns, just like District 11. In the center of the square, a permanent post - for official whippings, I guess - stockades, and - a gallows. Something I've seen only in old pictures. They plan - for executions.

Not only did we not calm the districts. Katniss and I brought more trouble down on our own, where we have been so ignored, so blasé all these years, that most of us probably don't even know what all the punishable offenses are.

I step up to stand beside Katniss and she looks at me in horror. What did we do? What did we not do? How could all this stem from those berries? I wish I'd never found them. I wasn't supposed to have. I deliberately wandered off - irked by Katniss not trusting me to defend myself in the woods - and found them by a stream. If I had never found them, I would not have accidentally killed Foxface with them. And Katniss would not have had an easy way for us both to challenge the Gamemakers - to make them stick to their word and let both of us win. I had been so close to dying, anyway. Without the berries, she would not have been able to force their hand quickly enough - I surely would have bled out, problem solved.

Or, maybe not. Surely, there must have been some long-simmering anger, some existing underground preparing for an uprising, and Katniss just provided the spark. Maybe my death - Katniss returning home a sole victor - would not have even been enough to contain it. Could she have served as inspiration on her own? I don't know. But I do know the Capitol's crackdown on 12 is directly the result of both of us still being alive, and not quite in love enough.

"Thread's a quick worker," comments Haymitch, forcing me out of these thoughts.

As he says it, we see smoke rising from the far side of town. Where the Hob is.

Katniss stirs. "Haymitch, you don't think everyone was still in -."

"Nah, they're smarter than that. You'd be too, if you'd been around longer. Well, I better go see how much rubbing alcohol the apothecary can spare." He takes off, and I cringe at his words. He gets his white liquor from the Hob.

"What's he want that for?" Katniss asks me. Then her eyes widen. "We can't let him drink it. He'll kill himself, or at the very least go blind. I've got some white liquor put away at home."

"Me, too." Sometimes, Haymitch is like our own very troubled kid. "Maybe that will hold him until Ripper finds a way to be back in business." I stare at my old bedroom window, which overlooks the square. "I need to check on my family."

"I have to go see Hazelle," she says.

I glance at the Peacekeepers - they seem unfamiliar. I wonder if our old ones were all recalled back to the Capitol. "I'll go, too. Drop by the bakery on my way home."

"Thanks."

We walk east, toward the Seam, and pass the townhouses. It's early enough, I guess, but even so, it's weird to run into no one on the road. We see people staring out their windows, but they draw away as we pass. They know - or guess - that we're targets now, since the incident on the square. Gale's whipping may have inspired Katniss' decision to rebel, but it may also have simultaneously killed the possibility of a District 12 uprising. If it ever existed.

I've never been to Gale's house. I only once went to Katniss' old house in the Seam, the day after all the festivities ended on our return from the Capitol after the Games, and I walked her home. I was surprised how small it was, and I'm even more surprised that the Hawthorne house really isn't much bigger, despite the larger size of the family. There are three beds in the one bedroom and two in the living room. We find Hazelle here, anxiously tending to her little daughter, who is flushed with the measles.

Katniss tells Hazelle that Gale will be ready to come home in a day or two, and can return to the mines in a couple of weeks.

"Might not be open until then, anyway," Hazelle replies. "Word is they're closed until further notice."

Which means, when they reopen, the miners will have to play catch-up with longer shifts and increased production numbers. Hell.

"You closed down, too?" Katniss asks her.

"Not officially, but everyone's afraid to use me, now."

I remember that Hazelle runs a laundry service.

"Maybe it's the snow," I say, hopefully.

"No, Rory made a quick round this morning. Nothing to wash, apparently."

Her second-oldest son wraps his arms around her. "We'll be all right."

Katniss leaves some money on the table and promises something from her mother for the little girl, then we leave the house and stand in the cold air, thinking our own thoughts.

"You go on back," she tells me. "I want to walk through the Hob."

"I'll go with you," I say. I'm exceedingly anxious about her making it home without causing an incident with the new Peacekeepers. They are probably just itching to draw her into something.

"No," she says. "I've dragged you into enough trouble."

I look at her and smile. "And avoiding a stroll by the Hob … that's going to fix things for me?" She seems hesitant, rooted to the spot, so I take her hand, and we wind through the Seam until we reach the Hob - really just an old warehouse that used to store coal, until the tracks from the mines to the train station were built. The main mine entrance is just beyond, and, sure enough, the metal doors are chained shut.

The Hob burns, melting the snow all around it. A few people have come to watch it burn, but nothing else happens.

Katniss points out the black liquid running down the street. "It's all that coal dust, from the old days. I want to check on Greasy Sae."

"Not today, Katniss. I don't think we'd be helping anyone by dropping in on them."

We head back into town and stop at the bakery, going in the front door, so I can avoid my mother, who is probably in the back office. My father's at the counter and helps Katniss pick out some cakes.

"That was quite the storm," my father says to me.

"It's been quite the winter. I hope that was the last one. I'm ready for spring."

"Aren't we all?" he replies lightly.

"Can you order some sugar and butter for me? I'm just about out of both …."

.

.

The next day, I'm on hand - with cheese buns - when Katniss' mother pronounces Gale fit to travel. He seems eager to be home and flies through breakfast. Katniss offers to walk him back to the Seam, but he says, "No - Rory took out tesserae. I need - to talk to him alone."

There's no hint that there is a new understanding between them. Of course, they could be avoiding showing any signs of affection around me. Not that that's necessary. Or maybe their understanding runs so deep and long that there doesn't have to be an outward sign of their relationship changing. I'm sure by now, with him staying here, there have been more kisses exchanged.

"He's going to freak out when he sees what's in the square now," frets Katniss.

"You keep expecting Gale to explode or something," Prim says soothingly. "But he's really more in control of his emotions than - you think."

"You didn't see him when I told him about District 8," she says. "If I'd been wearing a Peacekeeper uniform at the time, he might have shot me himself."

Over the next two weeks, while the weather clears, things only get more grim. Train shipments are cancelled - or the shipments themselves are smaller than expected - so the shops and grocer start running low on food. Parcel Day - the day each month when the extra food comes from the Capitol as part of the prize for Katniss and I winning the Hunger Games - arrives with the food spoiled and infested with rats. There isn't even enough grain and oil for the monthly tesserae allotments. As Hazelle predicted, the mines stay shut for two weeks, so half of the district couldn't afford to buy food even if it was available. I'm grateful for having ordered fresh supplies. I can help - carefully, carefully - with bread where the want is most severe. But even those of us better off are going to be eventually starved out just through the sheer lack of food.

Things are in motion - and it is grimly clear exactly who has the upper hand.


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter Twelve**

* * *

"When can we _eat_ the cake?"

I remain perfectly still, squatting down low so that my eyes are level with the countertop and I can squint in detail at the slice of chocolate cake from the capitol - its slick surface of smooth, glossy icing; the perfectly geometric shape of the fine spun-sugar web that decorates the top - the precise white-and-brown checkerboard of the cake. Compared to my version - side by side - the capitol's is markedly more precise. But I'm improving. "Bakers don't eat cake; they make them and watch other people buy them."

"Then who would be a baker?" asks Ally, impatiently.

"Eating one's own cake," I respond, "is an act of violence. Why would I put this much work into something and then - tear it apart, grind it away?"

Ally rolls her eyes at me and I nearly grin at the expression so reminiscent of Ryan's. My younger relatives are becoming as impatient with me as the older ones always have been. Time was, she looked up to me, almost as you do an older brother. But she's growing up fast, and her life has been rough - it tells on her. Her face has that stamp of the world-weary. She's way, way too young, for the droop of her pale eyes.

"Food is food - cake is cake," she says.

I sigh. "And to think I thought to make you a baker. You could, you know - mom would take you in."

"I'm not a Mellark. The bakery is for Will and Ryan's kids."

"Like anyone is going to marry those two," I snort, straightening up. I look at her and anxiety pokes at me. "Anyway - when do you _think_ you get to eat the cake? It's for your birthday, silly."

She pffts. "Oh, I thought it was for yours. Who cares about my birthday? Who wants to be 12?"

I smile at her. "I think I took the bullet for the family," I tell her, trying to sound completely sincere and not at all worried. "You'll be fine."

I just hope it helps her, because it doesn't really help me. And I thought I dreaded the Reaping before. There is no comfort - not in my own safety - not in the hopeful safety of my relatives and friends. I will have to take the stage on Reaping Day - complicit - and stand there while the children are selected. I will have to send them - prepare them - for the arena and I can't - I simply can't - visualize this. It's an impossibility.

Of course, I've thought that about a lot of things.

"You'd better head home," I say. "It's getting late."

"Just a bite - just off the Capitol piece. Please?"

"That thing has been in the freezer for weeks - it's probably disgusting." I firmly shepherd her to the front door, go out with her to the porch and watch as she ties her scarf around her neck.

No, I was in no state to take my cousins in a few months ago - nor would their father agree to it, anyway - but they get money from me, as long as Uncle Dana behaves himself. And I'll make sure they will be able to set themselves up in something. Dana has no particular industry - he inherited, and ignored into the ground, some second-hand shop from my grandparents. I'll figure something out for the kids. Something - anything - positive to come of my victory in the Games.

"Uh oh," she says, suddenly.

I come sharply out of my reverie and see it, too. A pair of Peacekeepers have just exited Katniss' house, and turn to look down the row toward mine. They descend from her porch and approach us, their white uniforms standing out against the dirty snow. They pass the empty house next to Katniss', they pass Haymitch's house.

"Ally," I say. "Ally, you'd better get home, now."

"But - Peeta -."

"Just go - don't worry about me. Just go home. I'll see you tomorrow."

She is hesitant, but also not a fool. She skips down the steps as if nothing was amiss, and walks lightly over the snow, passing the Peacekeepers with a nod. Once clear of them, she just glances backwards - once - at me, and then takes off running. I realize I have been holding my breath, and I let it go, now, painfully. It fogs all around me.

They are unfamiliar, as is the case nowdays. One is a female, one is a male - apart from that, there is no real distinguishing feature. Hard brown eyes, hardened faces. The usual. "Can I help you?"

"We're looking for Katniss Everdeen. Is she here?"

Oh, shit. Here we go. "No."

"Mind if we look around?" the female Peacekeeper asks me as she pushes me backward into my house.

"Not at all."

I'm held at gunpoint ny the other while she quickly searches upstairs and downstairs. It's by no means a thorough sweep of the house, though. Back in the kitchen, she ends by taking a large and ugly swipe out of the prettier of the two cakes - the sample I brought back from the Capitol - and I just hope it tastes as bad as I told Ally it did. Violence, indeed.

I'm dying to ask what is going on, but I know better. Instead I say, casually, "Have you checked her cousin's house?"

"Yes," is the terse reply. "Come along with us, Mr. Mellark."

My heart jumps into my throat. I'm not sure what I'm supposed to have done, but I'm pretty sure I'm about to be disappeared like Cray. They march me up the row and then up the steps to Katniss' house. Haymitch comes out of his house just as we're on the porch, and shouts over, "Problem?"

"Why don't you join us, Mr. Abernathy?"

"Think I will! Let me just get my shoes and I'll be right over." He ducks back into his house and I'm strangely comforted. He's got a phone, he can call … who? I don't know. Someone. Haymitch will get us out of this.

Prim and her mother are sitting together in the parlor, quiet, hands on laps. I see dinner finished, but unserved, on the stove. I try to smile at them as I'm sat down across from them. There's silence until Haymitch comes in, quietly, and joins us. He looks mildly puzzled.

"All right, now you're all going to tell us what you know about Miss Everdeen's movements. When was the last time she was at home?"

Haymitch and I look at the women. It's Prim who speaks. "At lunch. She was going to deliver some medicines and then - hang out with some friends."

"What friends?"

Prim wrinkles her nose. "She didn't say, but - it could be the Hawthornes or Leevy. She was going to be in the Seam most of the day. It could also be Madge Undersee, she goes there a lot."

No one nods, or writes anything down.

"How long does Miss Everdeen usually spend outside the District fence?"

"What are you talking about?" asks Mrs. Everdeen.

The female Peacekeeper gives a short laugh. "It's well known Miss Everdeen violates district and safety regulations by unlawfully venturing outside the District 12 boundaries. The question is, how long has she been out already - how long do you usually have to wait until she comes back?"

"We all _don't_ know anything about that," says Haymitch suddenly. "And neither do you."

"We know she's out there today. We know she's been there since early this morning. What we don't know is whether or not she'll be coming back."

"We don't know that either," says Haymitch.

"Well, you all better hope she does."

I bite my lip. Could she - _would she_ \- have actually done it? She's been staying inside the fence line since the crackdown, knowing now there would be no escaping the penalty if she were caught. Perhaps it was the starvation in the district - perhaps she went to hunt. But I think she would only do that if it got desperate for her and her family. Any game distributed would be death to her and to anyone who received it.

Would she have really left Prim behind to face any punishment brought down because of her flight? Would she have even left me? It was her idea for me to go. She certainly seemed sincere. Would she have left Gale? He's suspiciously absent from this meeting.

Anxiety and jealousy twist at me, but I fight them. Surely, she would not leave without giving word. There has to be some other explanation.

"Peeta," Haymitch calls to me. "Do you play chess?"

"I know how to, yes," I answer.

I join him at a side table and pull a second rocking chair over. Haymitch sets up the board and I stare at my hands. If they are not expecting Katniss to come back, how long are they going to stand here before they take us in for - what? More questioning, the stocks, whipping - worse? Haymitch keeps glancing over at me, I know. Probably would like to ask what I know - or maybe there's information he wants to pass on, I don't know.

Haymitch is pretty good at chess, it turns out, and I'm distracted, so he dispatches me twice fairly quickly - which annoys rather than delights him. I make a more solid stand the third time, and that helps pass the time. Prim reads a textbook. Her mother starts knitting something. Darkness falls.

"OK," says the female Peacekeeper, finally, making us all jump. "You'll all be moving out with us to the square."

"On what grounds?" asks Haymitch.

"Thread will-." And at that there is a noise at the front door. Katniss' mom jumps up, and I want to - but Haymitch grasps my arm. With the Peacekeepers' attention swiveled away from us for the moment, he mouths, "Be cool."

The Peacekeepers go toward the front door and Katniss' mother goes behind them. Prim stands up and takes a position by the hearth, nervously straightening out her skirts.

"Hello," says Katniss.

Prim, Haymitch and I exchange looks of intense relief. For me, the relief is laced with a hot, sick feeling - and I realize that despite everything I told myself, some part of me was convinced that she had fled the district with Gale.

"Here she is, just in time for dinner!" says her mother. Though dinner's long cold.

"Can I help you with something?" asks Katniss.

"Head Peacekeeper Thread sent us with a message for you."

"They've been waiting for hours," adds her mother, which gets her an ugly look from the Peacekeepers.

"Must be an important message."

"May we ask where you've been, Miss Everdeen?"

"Easier to ask where I _haven't_ been," she says, crossing through the kitchen and into view.

There's something - off about her, but I can't tell what it is. Maybe it's just that she's moving with caution, but she seems less graceful, more awkward, than usual.

She sees us and when she meets my eyes, there is both surprise and gratitude there.

"So, where haven't you been?" asks Haymitch.

"Well, I haven't been talking to the Goat Man about getting Prim's goat pregnant, because someone gave me completely inaccurate information as to where he lives," she says to Prim, emphatically.

"No, I didn't," says Prim, like Haymitch picking up and going along with her. We all know she knows exactly where the Goat Man lives. "I told you exactly."

"You said he lives beside the west entrance to the mine."

"The east entrance."

"You distinctly said the west, because then I said 'Next to the slag heap?' and you said 'Yeah.'"

"The slag heap next to the east entrance."

"No - when did you say that?"

"Last night," says Haymitch, chuckling.

"It was definitely the east," I add. Katniss glares at me - we are seasoned acting partners, now - and I smile at her. "I'm sorry, but it's what I've been saying. You don't listen when people talk to you."

"Bet people told you he didn't live there today and you didn't listen again."

"Shut up, Haymitch."

Haymitch and I laugh, but Katniss' eyes are still trained on mine. "Fine, somebody else can arrange to get the stupid goat knocked up."

"What's in the bag?" asks the female Peacekeeper, and we look back in their direction. Her partner is smiling.

Tension rises in me again as I notice that Katniss' game bag is on the table. But she goes to it without hesitation – though with a small hitch in her step - and empties it out. "See for yourself."

In a miraculous turn of events, her game bag is filled with – innocuous supplies. Bandages. Candy. Now that there is a good excuse to, I move toward the kitchen, toward the Peacekeepers, closer to Katniss. I pick up the candy bag. "Ooh, peppermints," I say, popping one in my mouth.

"They're mine!" says Katniss, making a grab for the bag. I laugh and toss it to Haymitch, who then passes it to Prim, who is also laughing now. It's a normal sound, at last.

"None of you deserve candy!" Katniss exclaims.

"Why, because we're right?" I walk up to her and wrap my arms around her. I feel a slight spasm, followed by a gasp, which she elongates into a groan of frustration. I look at her and can see the pain in her eyes. She's hurt. Something or someone hurt her. "OK," I tell her softly. "Prim said west, I distinctly heard west. And we're all idiots. How's that?"

"Better," she says. She parts her lips - _part of the act_ , I warn myself, although it could also be a reflex, left over from the tour. Whatever it is, I kiss her, just long enough to feel the soft flesh of her lips harden as they press against mine. It's like the closing act of the play. She swallows and blinks at the Peacekeepers. "You have a message for me?"

"From Head Peacekeeper Thread. He wanted you to know that the fence surrounding District 12 will now have electricity twenty-four hours a day."

"Didn't it already?" Katniss asks, just this side of sarcastic. So - she already knows something about this.

"He thought you might be interested in passing this information on to your cousin."

"Thank you. I'll tell him. I'm sure we'll all sleep a little more soundly now that security has addressed that lapse."

 _Katniss._ I want to squeeze her a warning. But there's admiration, too - always that, too.

The Peacekeepers leave. I'm not sure what their plan was for us if Katniss had not arrived - which they clearly expected. But the immediate threat is over. I sigh - Katniss slumps down and I hold her up. "What's wrong?" I say in a low voice.

"I banged up my left foot. The heel. And my tailbone's had a bad day, too."

Frowning, I help her over to the rocker I was sitting at earlier, and sit her down so her mother can conduct an examination.

"What happened?" she asks, slipping off Katniss' boots.

She bites her lip. "I slipped and fell." In the disbelieving pause that greets her words, she grunts and adds, "On some ice."

Katniss' mother diagnoses her with a broken heel and bruised tailbone. She's given a snowpack and has to put her foot up. She's served stew in the sitting room, while the rest of us eat, mostly in silence, at the kitchen table. Prim joins her and they talk quietly together for a while until their mother brings out some tea, to which she adds a dose of sleep syrup. I join them and assist her when she wraps Katniss' foot.

"I'll help you upstairs," I say to Katniss, as her eyes start to immediately droop.

I put her arm around my shoulder and help her up. But she's unsteady on her feet, so I just lift her up in my arms, and she nuzzles her face against my shoulder as I carry her upstairs. She's so small and light.

"Which room is yours?" I ask her, putting my lips on her hair.

She points, and I carry her in there, feeling weird about it. Even though we have spent nights together - sharing a sleeping bag, sharing a bed - this seems far more intrusive, like I'm invading her space, with all my warm and tender, hot and jealous, unchaste thoughts. Her room, like my own, is Capitol furnished, and there's not much in it besides the bed and dresser and a couple of chairs. I set her down, pull her covers on her and look at her frail face. This girl that President Snow is so afraid of. I wonder - what will come next? How long will we have to live under this oppression and this constant fear of reprisal?

"Good night," I say wearily. But she grabs my hand so that I can't leave and she looks at me with such a strange expression.

"Don't go yet. Not until I fall asleep."

It's a plea from the train - from my domain, crashing into hers, where it has no place, no future. But I can do nothing but obey. I sit down on the bed next to her and put my other hand on hers. She blinks at me - sleep is coming fast, but she's holding out on it. Holding off the nightmares that come when you sleep alone.

I smile at her. "Almost thought you'd changed your mind today. When you were late for dinner." Why I confess this, I don't know. Part of me is still angry, I guess, that she went outside the fence – clearly, she did - at the risk to everyone else. Part of me wants to remind her that _I'm_ the one who agreed to leave with her.

"No," she says, her voice faint, but firm. "I'd have told you." She pulls my hand up to her cheek and holds it there, still just looking at me with her sleepy eyes. There are no cameras. There is only her and me, in the dim light of her bedside oil lamp. And this is why I can't keep my promises - to her or to myself. I can never just be friends with this girl. I don't want to - and she won't let me, anyway. Something, somewhere inside her belongs to me in just the same way that all of me belongs to her. Maybe it's not that big - maybe it's not big enough. But it's there.

"Stay with me," she commands, in a slurred voice.

She means now, in this last moment before she drops off to sleep. If she dared to, she'd ask for more - ask for me to stay with her the night so that the nightmares don't come. But in my head the command grows larger. It covers all nights, for all time - and the days, as well. Capitol or no Capitol. Gale or no Gale. Whenever she needs me.

"Always," I promise, as she closes her eyes.

* * *

When I go home, I root through some of the boxes that I brought to Victors' Village when I moved here from the bakery and never fully unpacked. Untouched since then are my childhood sketchbooks - three of them, spanning eight years of drawing.

Last summer, I bundled the sketchbooks together, hid them in my sock drawer, and wrote a note on top of them, in case I did not return home from the Reaping. It was an impulsive gesture, belonging to that 16-year-old boy who might as well have been 5, that's how much older I feel now. In my note, I left the sketchbooks to Katniss:

"In the event of my death, please give these to Katniss Everdeen."

That's the outside of the note. Inside, it gets even worse:

"Katniss, this might surprise you, but I want you to have these. You're my inspiration."

At first I laugh - what an ignorant little boy, I think. Then I feel ashamed.

 _That doesn't sound like you._

How cynical have I become to feel _this_ superior to my own naive sincerity? Why do I despise the boy and his crush on the girl who doesn't love him? Does it make me somehow less hurt, less regretful, to dismiss him? I suppose - if things had gone the way they might have gone - it _would_ have been an odd surprise for Katniss, to be handed this bequest. And, knowing her as I do now - slightly embarrassing. But haven't I been subduing it long enough? - this love for her, twisting around in me, twisted around all the rest of the trauma so that it is hard, sometimes, to tell the difference between the hurt the Capitol caused me and the hurt she did.

It doesn't need reciprocation to be real. It doesn't need reciprocation to be _important_.

It's simply - and in all complex ways, as well - a part of who I am, and has been, ever since she sang those first notes in school and a love of all things beautiful sprang up in me. This says as much about me as it does about her. I think it's high time I openly acknowledged this.

She _did_ inspire me. To be bigger than myself, to be larger than my circumstances.

And - it's not just about how mysterious and magical, how frustrating and alluring, how _Katniss_ she is. It's about me - about who I really am - about the very specific ways that I respond to her. The things that I value, have always valued, that have their fulfillment in her.

Burnt fingers. A broken heart. That's how it should have ended. But for the Games. And the Games - and my own particular game within them - has created a shift in the storyline. A way that my love for her means much more than a pitiable impulse. It has meant - fire for Panem, but not just in anger, not just in rebellion. At the core of it, the inspiration was love; and from love comes devotion - then loyalty and, finally, sacrifice. Something Panem needed to see, to feel, after all this time. And that comes from me. So, it has come to be that, at the end of the day, in whatever way we burn, now - burn to death or burn down the Capitol - it will be in part because _I loved Katniss Everdeen_.

And that is enough.


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter Thirteen**

* * *

"I hear you're bedridden for six weeks."

I throw her a sympathetic glance from her doorway, and she gestures me into the bedroom. She's still finishing her breakfast from a tray, and I drag a chair next to her bed and just watch her finish eating - it's a peculiar delight, as always.

"To be honest," she says, "I - it gives me time to think about some stuff, and I'd be OK with it, except for that there are times I'd rather be thinking - somewhere else."

So - she is planning something again. I look at her thoughtfully, an idea forming. But I'm going to be very careful about it. "Well, I don't know what to do about it except to help keep you from getting bored."

"For six weeks? You have your work cut out."

"I know. I actually brought something over that I thought would give you a good laugh." I pull the note from my pocket and explain its origins to her. "Feel free to laugh," I say, handing it to her. "I certainly did."

But she doesn't. She reads it thoughtfully, then gives me a glance. "It's sweet," she says.

"You're just saying that."

"No. I'm not saying that if you had left this to me before I really knew you it wouldn't have been a little - odd. But now that I know you, I'm … so touched. Don't you berate this boy," she says, handing me back the note. "He was good to me."

I blush.

"Did we talk about your sketchbooks - in the arena?"

"No," I say. "I didn't talk about them much to anyone - my brothers used to tease me."

She shakes her head. "Can I see them? Or are you still planning to leave them to me in your will?"

I laugh. "Sure, I guess." Some of the sketches are of her, but it's not like that should come as a surprise to her, anyway. I root around inside my jacket for a stubby little pencil - I always have one on me - and write a new note underneath the old one. I hand her back the note, with the pencil:

 _Can you write what you want to tell me?_

"I'll bring them over tomorrow morning, if you want me to."

 _Yesterday I met two rebels from 8. Rebellion going badly. They were heading toward 13. They think it might still exist._

"I'd love that," she says, watching my face as I read.

 _Exist?_

"OK, it's a deal. Are you sure you're not tired of cheese buns, yet?"

 _They think there are people who still live there. That they have nuclear weapons. And so the Capitol leaves them alone._

I raise my eyebrows at her and she shrugs in response. That sounds far-fetched and desperate. But so does the notion of Panem falling apart because Katniss offered me a handful of poisonous berries. And that definitely seems to be happening.

"Don't you dare even think about bringing me something other than cheese buns," she says.

I light one of the candles in her room, lightly kiss the piece of notepaper we've filled up with too much information, and watch it burn. She nods her approval.

The next day, I bring the newest of my sketchbooks. It has the most pictures of Katniss, the more refined work of the last few years - and the most blank pages in it. We have a second, short conversation via print:

 _What do you want to do?_

 _I want to find out if 13 really still exists._

 _Then what?_

 _Maybe we can get a message to them. Ask for help. Find out why they didn't before._

 _How?_

She taps the pencil against her lips for a moment.

 _I don't know yet._

We discuss the possibility of messengers, carrier pigeons, secret codes in our next broadcasts, how much we might be able to learn about 13 in the Capitol when we are mentors this summer. At the end of the week, we're no closer to an answer, and finally Katniss just says we can think about it more - maybe talk to Haymitch about it - when she's mobile again.

"I have a surprise for you," she says on a morning near the end of the first week. It's Saturday, already - the time is actually flying by. "I have a sketchbook of my own."

It turns out to be an old book that has been in her family for many years. It started with her mother's side - they were apothecaries, and the book has sketches and descriptions of the medicinal uses of local plants. Her father took over at some point, adding sketches and descriptions of the local edible plants.

"I've wanted to add some other stuff - stuff I've learned on my own, or learned last year in the training center. But - I'm not an artist. Do you …?"

She holds the book out to me and I take it, reverently. I smile, flipping gently through the yellow pages. "So, this is the secret to becoming Katniss Everdeen."

"Partly," she replies.

"Yes. I'd love to help - I'd be honored to help. I could even recolor some of these older ones. Do you have any samples of the things you want to add?"

"I have some. Some I'll have to describe for you."

I nod. "OK. That sounds good. I've missed drawing."

"So - do you want to start tomorrow?"

I pause. I have been giving this a lot of thought. "How about Monday? I thought I'd … leave Sunday open, for Gale. I know that is your day with him and I don't - want to intrude on it."

She looks startled, but nods sharply. "Oh. I - he might still be doing the seven-day shifts ..." Then she looks at me, and decides to acknowledge my offer for the token of friendship that it is. "Thank you, Peeta. Monday, then."

"Monday."

The next few weeks pass this way. Slowly, the long winter starts to recede, and the district struggles back to life. The mines are in full operation. Food delivery resumes. There's a hush in the district there never was before. A feeling like we've been knocked down and are still waiting for our breath to come back. The less wary are taken in for minor infractions - an unkept lawn, loitering too long in the square - and so the stocks are full. But we've avoided any more public whippings, or worse. So far.

I spend the days with Katniss - except the one - sketching plants and coloring them in. I carry her downstairs for lunch and linger for a little bit while she watches TV in the afternoon - fixating on the screen every time District 13 is mentioned. The Capitol's news stories about 13 - rare though they are - always show the ruins of the town square, and, prominently, the crumbled Justice Building. Theoretically, the rest of the district could be intact. There's no real proof one way or another.

Some days, there is little talking - just us sitting side by side on the sofa, or at the table or on her bed, me drawing, she writing. Some days, when I am drawing something from out of her memory, there is a lot of back and forth. Her description, my first draft, her amendments, my second draft, etc. Sometimes in the silence - if I'm not completely engrossed in the work - I become aware of the whisper of her breath. I hear it quicken. I hear it catch. One time I feel a tingling sensation down my neck and I look up to see her just staring at me. She starts, as if I've scared her out of some reverie and a blush darkens her cheeks.

"You know," I say, "I think this is the first time we've ever done anything normal together."

"Yeah. Nice for a change," she says, lightly, but with a soft tremble in her voice.

In the look she gives me, I see that she now knows what I have known for sure since the Victory Tour. That among the multitudes of contrasting and contradictory impulses that make up Katniss Everdeen, one of them is a longing for me.

* * *

April passes and the snows finally start to melt. Katniss starts walking around - first on makeshift crutches - and with mobility her restlessness returns. After our first few conversations about her interest in 13, we dropped all discussion of it. Now I can see the wheels start to turn again in her head and I feel a vague reciprocal anxiety. On top of that, the 75th Hunger Games - the 3rd Quarter Quell - is now less than three months away. I have had no special instructions as a new mentor, and until now, had given no real thought to the fact that I will have to serve as one to a kid I probably know - at least by sight. Even the Seam kids are better known to me now, through Katniss, and through the deliveries of bread I made - as surreptitiously as possible - during the worst of the crackdown.

Returning to the Capitol presents layers of problems - from the necessity of putting on the act-that-isn't-really-an-act - to being in such close proximity to President Snow, who seems unable to decide whether he wants us dead or married. If wedding dresses have been ordered, can a Capitol wedding be far behind? Will they make us do it during the Quell? Surely the Gamemakers are pitching it - the ratings would be huge.

My deliveries of bread had another benefit - my friends from high school, Sammy, Quill and Hendry are talking to me again on a regular basis. They even come over one Sunday. I'm invited to the wrestling tournament at the end of April, in which Sammy will be competing.

I'm actually heading out the door to go to the school, when Portia arrives.

I hug her enthusiastically and she eyes me closely. "You seem - a bit happier."

"Happy to see you," I say. "It's been a rough couple of months here." But I feel like the lightness of my tone must betray me. "What are you doing here?"

"I came with Cinna," she says, gesturing over her shoulder with her thumb. "Katniss' whole team is here today, filming her in her wedding dresses. I just came along for the ride and I thought I'd take the chance to visit."

"Oh," I say, glancing toward Katniss' house. "Should I do something?" Probably not. The dresses are not going to put Katniss in the best frame of mind. In fact, I'm instantly dreading my next visit with her.

Portia shakes her head. "It's bad luck for the groom to see the bride's wedding dress. The Capitol audience won't want to see you there."

"But - but - won't I see them on TV?"

She smiles. "They don't look at it that way. To them - you are a character on TV. They're not going to imagine Peeta-the-viewer, just Peeta-the-groom staying properly absent. Besides, there are six dresses, each with its own set of accessories. It is going to be one long, boring photo shoot."

"Well, what do you want to do? I'd show you my recent sketches but they're all at Katniss' house. And I've only started one painting since the Tour."

"Why don't we take a walk? Show me the district."

I shake my head at this notion, but comply. We walk east toward the Seam and I show her the mines, the house where Katniss used to live. We walk through the Meadow, where the spring wildflowers are finally struggling out of the ground. We walk into town and we go silent crossing the square. We go to the bakery and I show off the cakes in the window that I decorated two days ago. We walk in and my nerves jangle as I introduce her to my father, who is managing the store, and mother, who comes up from the back office. My relationship with my parents - as much as I've tried mending it these past weeks - is still strained with old resentments on all sides. So, what they make of this Capitol stylist and her easy relationship with me, I don't know. They just answer her friendly questions shortly. I can't stop thinking how it was _Portia_ who encouraged me to draw; how it was Portia who told me I should fight for my life in the arena.

"So, that's where I come from," I say, a little apologetically.

We pass the school and I suddenly remember that I was supposed to be there, cheering on one of my oldest friends. Damn it. Just when life was starting to resemble normalcy, again, the Capitol arrives with its reminders that life will never be anything but weird ever again.

"Hey, Peeta," says Portia with a small laugh. "Where are you?"

"Oh! I was just thinking - about school," I stammer. It's not that I resent her - never. I like Portia - I miss her when she is not around. I sincerely think that she likes me, too. But she's a stand-in for the Capitol, right now … she's helped make the wedding dresses that are the fake costumes that smother the real feelings. She helped bring them here, and that will hurt Katniss. Not her fault. Except that all of this - this - weirdness - is on all of us. To break with or to collude. The choice is there, somewhere.

I can't very well take Portia into a high school gym to watch some wrestling match, so we walk into the west neighborhoods of District 12, where the more "well-to-do" live. Descendants of informants from the Dark Days, who were given large houses and some kind of compensation for turning on their fellow rebels. But they starve with the rest of us when the food shipments don't come in. They make do with healers and apothecaries instead of hospitals and doctors. They are restricted to 12 education and the 12 trades.

Afternoon is dissolving into evening when we return to my house and I make coffee and lay out whatever leftovers I have lying around. Portia is enthusiastic, but eats like a bird.

Before she leaves, she tells me that I can see Katniss' wedding dresses on TV tomorrow and maybe, maybe if I have a favorite, they can see about gaming the vote. I laugh, but say I would have to consult with Katniss on that - and she smiles and says, "Already figured out the secret of a happy marriage."

In the morning, I can't quite shake the unsettled feeling that Portia brought with her from the Capitol. I know Katniss will be in no mood to see me - her designated groom - after whatever she went through yesterday, so I will have to occupy myself today. I do owe some apologies, so I head out early, to catch Sammy before he leaves for school, and try to explain. I bring the last of my current batch of cheese buns to his family's townhouse and am invited in for breakfast.

Sammy's trophy is on the mantelpiece; 1st place - so I believe him when he tells me he didn't even notice my absence.

"Congratulations!" I say. "And I do apologize. I was about to leave for the match when the stylists and everyone arrived to film Katniss in a bunch of wedding dresses. I think it will be on TV tonight or something."

"So is the announcement of the Quell," says a grim voice behind us - Sammy's mother, with four kids between the ages of 12 and 18.

I look from her to Sammy and I am again forced to acknowledge the gulf between me, the Victor, and my friends, all still potential tributes. Plenty of merchant and town kids took out tesserae this winter. So, the odds that one of my old friends are reaped this year are higher than normal.

And the Quell is always more than just a normal Hunger Games. There's always some added twist to the Quarter Quell. The last one had twice the number of tributes.

I hurry back to the Village and go to Katniss' house - to warn her, in case she doesn't know - but find only her mother. "Prim's at school and Katniss went out. I think she said she was going to see if you or Haymitch were around."

"Oh, I've been in Town," I say, blankly.

I go to Haymitch's but he's not home. Maybe she found him in and took him for a walk to talk about the things in her head - 13 and the uprising in 8. I can hear the sarcasm in Haymitch's replies as clearly as if I was with them now.

With a strange feeling of time running out, I go into my study and stare at my current painting, wondering why it's been so stubbornly opposed to being finished. It's the first painting I've done not directly associated with the arena. It is a view from the train - from the rear car of the train with the retractable windows. It's just tracks, white fields, blue-gray sky. Cheerful enough. But it's missing something. What? Me getting my heart broken on the tracks? The heavily-guarded gates of District 11? Roaming cattle? What?

I start with clouds, with gray on white on gray. My nose right up against the canvas. A bird, maybe, in the corner of the frame, fluttering away. Yes. I can almost visualize it, as if I've seen it in real life, or maybe on television. A mockingjay. Black, with the white patch on the wing. And in the open horizon … a city in the distance, gray and crumbled, like decayed teeth. Gray on white on gray.

I'm satisfied with my broken city, for a second. Then I shake my head and whatever muse has me in its clutches prompts me to paint over it with a distant forest. Just a smudge - like watercolors - a thin line of trees at the far horizon. Home? Am I leaving home? No … I painstakingly remake my city ruins, peeking out over the trees. A dead city, lost in the woods. Just taking up a small space on the overall canvas, but a compelling image. I think.

I bring the canvas into the living room and set it up in the middle of the floor. I sit on the sofa and stare at it, stare - wondering what it is about it that I find so mesmerizing.

The dream startles me, because I was not aware of falling asleep. I'm back in the arena, standing in the lake. I'm barefoot and I can feel sand between my toes - all ten of them. There's no one around me. Nothing but the cornucopia a little way away. My subconscious has painted the arena exactly. The swoop of the woods on one side, the drop off to Thresh's fields on the other. I am just wondering to myself what day of the Games have I re-entered when I hear the howls of the muttation. As if on auto-pilot, I turn myself toward the cornucopia and run.

There is no Katniss to shoot the muttation that is upon me before I reach the horn, and I'm taken by the leg. Pain - the exact pain - overwhelms me. The wolf plays with me, flipping me around with my leg in its mouth and I'm defenseless. It drags me toward the mouth of the cornucopia and it's only when I'm there, writhing and helpless in the horn, that I see which mutt has me. Its caramel-colored fur and eyes silver as mist.

Katniss!

I think I might yell out the name as I wake up. But all I hear is the sound of my phone. I'm frozen, locked in the paralysis that always accompanies nightmares. I force my lungs to move, breathe in, breathe out. And then the buzzing sensation begins. Down my arms. Down my legs.

The phone has stopped ringing by the time I sit up. I wonder if it was Katniss or someone from the Capitol. I'm so rattled by the dream that I'm rather glad I missed the call, especially if it was Katniss. I thought I was done with that dream, which had reoccurred several times in the months after the games ended, but hasn't troubled me in ages. There's something deep and perverse about the dream, its meaning both obvious and obscure. It might say more about me than I want to know.

Suddenly, my television flickers on. "Mandatory programming." Really? I glance at the time and realize with a start that it is already 7:30. That means Caesar Flickerman's show. Katniss' wedding dresses. But why is it mandatory viewing for the districts?

Casear's stage is set up on the steps of the training center and the crowds in the avenue and surrounding streets - at least according to the Capitol editors - are enormous. But they hush in anticipation as he begins to speak.

"Ladies and gentlemen," he says, grinning at the crowd. "Welcome back to our special coverage of the wedding of the millennium! Our very own star-crossed lovers, Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark, are deep in the planning stages of their wedding. When will it be? That is still to be revealed. Where will it be? That voting will start next week. Tonight, we finally get to cast the - final - vote for the wedding dress."

Rapturous applause breaks out as Katniss and I appear in solemn still images in the huge screen behind Caesar.

"Are you ready to see the finalists?"

Screams of assent. But Caesar shakes his head, with a wink.

"First, oh first, though, we need to bring out the freshman stylist who has taken the Games by storm! He works in fire. He works in jewels. Gossamer. Silk. Ladies and gentlemen - Cinna!"

Cinna enters from somewhere in the background and Caesar invites him to sit, then sits across from him. Some of Cinna's most popular costumes for Katniss show up on the screen. "Cinna," says Caesar, in the usual wheedling voice he uses with scared tributes, "who knew that District 12 could look so stunning! You are a true miracle worker!"

Funny.

"Portia and I have extraordinary subjects," Cinna says with a smile.

Casear chuckles conspiratorially. The screen behind him changes so that we see, one after another, a series of white gowns. Six - twelve - eighteen … I lose count. "Now, Cinna, you have been very busy since the Tour, designing twenty-four unique and gorgeous potential wedding gowns for Miss Everdeen. How did you do it?"

"My partner, Portia, and I, have had a portfolio of potential gowns for years - we did not need to look much further than that for the initial ideas. And we have a very dedicated crew helping us out. Each dress took between three and seven days, total, to design and construct. But there was always overlap. We were always working on at least two at a time, usually three."

"Amazing! Don't you all agree?"

More cheers.

"Now - we have already had two votes, narrowing down our favorite choices among these incredible gowns from 24 to 12 and from 12 to 6. You are about to see the final six, ladies and gentlemen. And cast your final vote via the phone number that will appear on the screen at the end of the show. And we have a special treat. Cinna?"

"Yes - for the final 6 gowns, we actually have a model. Katniss herself tried on all 6 of the final gowns, as you will now see."

There is dramatic music and a dramatic swoop, as the camera closes in on the huge screen. Then I see Katniss, larger than life, standing in front of six backdrops and wearing six different wedding gowns. Because I promised Portia, I eye the dresses closely, trying to see - not which one I like best, but which one Katniss looks most comfortable in. Or - least uncomfortable, maybe.

They focus in on each dress individually, and Cinna's voice in the background describes them, using terms I don't understand - A-line, empire waist, sheath. A few do stand out. A cream-colored lace gown with tiny pink roses pulling up the outer skirt - Katniss' dark hair streaked with gold highlights and curled in ringlets that cascade down her back. A billowing dress of ivory satin with puffy sleeves - Katniss decorated with gold tattoos up her arm. A sleeveless gown as white as snow, glittering as if with diamonds - a jeweled veil falling on her cheek. And perhaps the most striking of all of them - Cinna describes it simply as a silk and organza ball gown, which completely fails to capture its drama. Its neckline is fairly low, revealing the top of her shoulders; its skirt falls open over a cloud of organza. Its long sleeves are tight to the forearm and then open wide to drip all the way down to the ground. She wears ropes of pearls at her neck and her veil hangs from a crown of pearls. I sit up straight at the sight of her. There's an upturn to her chin that I like.

Caesar concludes the program with the phone number to call to cast the vote. "Let's get Katniss Everdeen to her wedding in style!" Then, my hands tremble, as I wait for the next announcement. Sure enough, Caesar reminds everyone to stay tuned for the next bit of programming. "That's right - this year will be the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Hunger Games, and that means it's time for our third Quarter Quell!"

The anthem plays - that song that I grew so sick of hearing in the arena - and as it fades out, the words appear on the screen: The Reading of the Card. I almost laugh at the overkill, then remember I'm about to find out what horrific twist these upcoming games will take. The set on the top of the stairs blackens suddenly, then a spotlight appears, President Snow standing in its bright light. He walks to the center of the stage and the light follows him.

"Once, many years ago, this was a larger nation," he begins. It's the old tale - the history of Panem, which rose from the ruins of a continent called North America - nipped along its old shores by the dramatic rising of the seas, dried up by the droughts caused by the wreck of weather systems, poisoned by the chemical weapons and factories that were developed unchecked. In the subsequent battle for resources, humanity almost wiped itself out entirely.

Then came Panem - the last remnants of the race making a survival pact by forming thirteen co-dependent districts. Each would concentrate on the production of badly-needed resources - coal, food crops, livestock, lumber, stone - or the manufacture of badly needed supplies - transportation, electronics, textiles. A centralized government - the Capitol - would oversee the distribution of the resources throughout the new nation, while providing law and order of equal force throughout. But eventually, District 13 grew jealous of sharing its resources and convinced the other districts to help rebel against the Capitol and establish itself as the central governing power. The Dark Days. A long war (they never say how long) that again pushed humanity to the edge of extinction. The Capitol had no choice but to destroy 13 before too many lives were lost in the war. The destruction of 13 brought a swift end to it. But now, in order to punish the rebels without killing so many of them off as to render the destruction of 13 moot - and to remind the upcoming generations of Panem of their horrible penchant for self-destruction - the Capitol established the Hunger Games, which would serve as a perpetual reminder of the Dark Days.

Well, that's the official story. I've heard slightly different versions, but it's as hard to trust one as any other.

When the laws for the Games were established, they included the Quarter Quell system, which called for an amplified version of the arena to refresh the memory of the war every twenty-five years to a citizenry grown too accustomed to the Games. Each Quell is unique and was designed at the time of the original Gamemakers. Snow intones their history, thus far. "On the twenty-fifth anniversary, as a reminder to the rebels that their children were dying because of their choice to initiate violence, every district was made to hold an election and vote on the tributes who would represent it."

This - is a horrifying thought. I'm not sure how it would go down in other districts, but I know how it must have happened here in 12. The merchant class would have put pressure to bear to send a couple of Seam kids in, highlighting the fact that we were always a district divided against itself.

"On the fiftieth anniversary, as a reminder that two rebels died for each Capitol citizen, every district was required to send twice as many tributes."

Haymitch's games. I've always half-wanted, half-dreaded to find out how he won them against 47 competitors.

"And now we honor our third Quarter Quell."

My palms sweat as a little boy comes up to the top of the steps of the training center, holding out a small wooden box. The president opens the box and takes a very deliberate amount of time at it, hovering his hand over the envelopes within. The cameras linger, move among different angles. A close-up on the box. A close-up on Snow's lowered eyes. A long shot of the proceedings - of the single light illuminating the President.

Finally, the envelope is withdrawn and opened. A card is extracted. And Snow reads: "On the seventy-fifth anniversary, as a reminder to the rebels that even the strongest among them cannot overcome the power of the Capitol, the male and female tributes will be reaped from their existing pool of victors."


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter Fourteen**

* * *

 _Peeta Mellark!_

When Effie called my name last year at the Reaping, the people of my district surrounded me. It was for their sake, for the cameras' sake, that I somehow managed to separate myself from the crowd and climb up to the stage to join Katniss without completely breaking down.

Now, I'm alone. No cameras follow me. I'm cut off from the people of my district - even my family. Did they call my name? No - there's a fifty-fifty chance of that happening this time, as opposed to 1 in hundreds. But it doesn't matter. If it's me or Haymitch. Katniss. _Katniss._

Rage at my impotence rises up in me, threatens to choke me. I don't throw anything, but I'm tempted to take the painting - my last painting - and break the canvas frame over my knee. It is for myself that I remain calm. Myself and my team. I force myself to drink a glass of water and keep on breathing.

Haymitch. I have to talk to Haymitch. But first, I - I _have_ to see her. I run across the green to her house. Prim answers the door.

"Katniss - " I gasp, pushing my way inside.

"She's not here. She ran off - right after the announcement."

I look at her tear-stained face. "Where would she have-."

"If it weren't for the fence, I'd say the woods. So - I don't know."

We both turn as the door bursts open, but it's Gale. He's red-faced and panting, having made what must be record time from the Seam. He and I look at each other for a moment. It's funny - how little interaction we've had, considering how much time I've been spending here this spring.

Prim repeats to Gale what she told me. "We have to find her before she does something crazy," he says.

"Yes," I say. "But you go. I have to talk to Haymitch. I have to talk to Haymitch before she does."

At Haymitch's, I knock before I push open the door. It's futile usually to knock on his door, but who knows what mood he's in right now? Just because I've never seen it doesn't mean that he doesn't have a weapon other than that knife of his.

Katniss got Haymitch to hire Hazelle as a housekeeper during Thread's crackdown, so entering his house lately has not been nearly as noxious as usual. The old mildew and moldy food smells are gone. Nothing can quite eradicate the smell of old booze, though - that comes from him, anyway.

He's wide awake and hollow-eyed, sitting in a rocking chair by his stove, with a box of liquor bottles on the floor next to him. He's opening one now. When he sees me, his face cracks open in a ghastly smile. "Thought it would be you first."

"What do you mean?" I ask, though I know perfectly well.

"The girl - it always takes her a little longer to see the big picture. She'll spend some time feeling sorry for herself and then she'll remember - she'll be going in with one of us. You always see the whole thing right away. At least as far as she's concerned."

I sit down in the chair across from him.

"So?" he says.

"Haymitch - why is this happening? There's something almost too convenient about the whole thing."

He shrugs. "You know why it's happening."

My breath hurts as I suck it in. "Yes, but - OK, it's one way to - to get rid of a problem without resorting to suspicious accidents. In the short term. But in the long term, it makes no sense. It doesn't hurt the districts to do this. It's a reprieve for all the children of Panem this year. It's the people in the Capitol - they are the ones who aren't going to like it. They fawn over the Victors. I mean, they were voting on wedding dresses just seconds before hearing Katniss condemned to the arena. Why upset the one population you know you have under your control?"

Haymitch's eyes glint at me for several heartbeats. "Peeta, no offense - I know your parents. And while I definitely know where you got your unfortunate romantic streak, I really don't know where you got your brains. Here's the thing - do you think just because these people are in power they actually know what they're doing? ALL they know how to do is grab on and hold on to power. Eventually, all you can do to hold on is keep putting out the little fires and hope that they don't spread. Every once in awhile, that requires something drastic. Do you know how long Snow has been president of Panem? Forty-something years. All the smart people around him, the strategic thinkers, the naysayers, the people with morals? These people were all killed off before they could pose a threat."

"Oh."

"Yes, oh. So?" he says again, softly. "What do you want from me?"

"I want you to let me go back into the arena with her."

He lets out a mirthless laugh. "Your impulse toward self-destruction is impressive, kid. You might want to have someone check on that for you."

"This is as much for you as for her. You gave me the strategy that ended up saving my life. I'd be dead now if you hadn't. I know you did it for her. I know I asked you to do it for her. But still - I'm here. We probably wouldn't even be in this mess if I wasn't. This two-Victor thing was a mistake and the Capitol was never going to let it stand. If she goes in alone, she's dead for sure. But as long as only one of us is left at the end … and you know it _has_ to be her. So. Please, Haymitch."

"You've got your life to live, boy. How do you think I would feel if I stood there and didn't volunteer for you if yours is the name they call? I'd be obligated to save you this time, anyway."

"There are too many ways to die in the arena for that to be a problem. I think last year proved conclusively that I can get myself killed off without too much trouble."

He squints at me. "Is that what you took from it? Seems to me you held out longer than most people would have. If you could have seen me trying to scare up money for the antibiotic you needed … _days_ that took, and every morning I'd think, I'm too late again. But you were still sitting there, heart beating away. Then the Gamemakers interfered and I got to use the money on food, instead." He takes a long drink.

I'm touched - and a little flabbergasted - to get this admission from him. "I hope you set aside something for yourself, after all that effort," I say.

"Oh - I did. I mean, the champagne didn't quite make it into the basket."

I laugh. "Haymitch, don't you see? She needs you there - as the mentor. I wouldn't know the first thing to do. Who to approach. How to approach them. I need to be in the arena to - deflect the blows."

He winces. "What about _her?_ What do you expect me to tell her? She's going to beg me to make sure you don't go in."

"Do you think so?" I ask him.

"Don't go fishing for shit with me," he growls. "She threw all of Panem into chaos just because she wouldn't take the victory over you. I doubt I rate the same level of sacrifice."

"She did it because she was kind - and because she is - she always has been - a rebel."

He shakes his head. "You can't look at that Game - you can't - and not see it, how she feels about you."

"Well, that's over now, anyway. Let's look at the big picture, shall we? If I die in there - what are the consequences? The Capitol takes back my house and someone else is going to have to decorate the cakes. She dies? Her mother and Prim sent back to the Seam. No more victory winnings - they'd have to survive on their own with next to no income. The people who they heal for free because they can afford it? They wouldn't be able to do it anymore. The rebellion loses its - its mockingjay, or whatever she is to them. And me?" I shudder. "How long do you really think I'd last without her? Can't you see? It's - plain math."

"What about me?"

"What about you? First of all, you'd be no use protecting her in there, your withdrawals would be that bad. Your liver would probably keel over from the shock." I smile at him. "Anyway, I am never, never going to ask you to go in instead of me. You owe me this, Haymitch. I was left out of all your little plans last time, and now you owe me - whatever I ask for. And I owe you. And - you earned your victory."

"Earned it?" he says in a strained and faraway voice. "By killing kids? Maybe you earned yours more."

"I can't go around and around on this all night, Haymitch. When Katniss talks to you, I guess you can tell her anything you need to. But I'm begging you - begging you, Haymitch - to let me go back in with her. Please. It's the only choice that is left to me. They call my name - you don't volunteer."

"Has it occurred to you that this would play into their hands? That this gives them the opportunity to force her to do what they wanted her to in the first place?"

I shiver. "To kill me? Sure. But she won't. It won't come down to that again. And maybe – we can make sure their plan backfires."

I finally carry a vague, unsatisfactory OK with me when I leave his house. I suppose he feels obligated to hear her side of the story. I glance over at Katniss' house, wondering if she's back yet. No - I feel instinctively that when she's ready, she will first go to Haymitch. I'm feeling vaguely ill, anyway. Even after every argument I used with Haymitch, I haven't yet exorcised that dream. I don't know what seeing Katniss now, in this mood, will feel like. We're going to have a lot of time together, anyway, in these next few months. Just not as long as I had expected.

But - in a way - this makes sense for me. I'm tired of careening between hope and despair. Of living in fear of her being hauled off and hung in the square. Or being tortured and killed in the Capitol. No - I want her to defy the Capitol again - one more time - and exit the arena to find a full-scale revolution on hand, taking down the people who would hurt her. Somehow - some way - it's got to work out. As with the last arena, my part in it will be small. Except that … except that ... I will again have the chance to choose love over my own life. The very heart and soul of rebellion. I understand this, now. It's bigger than me. It's larger than my circumstances.

I find myself walking toward Town. I don't know why - but I need to go back home. I guess I need someone to pity me - only me. I walk around to the back of the bakery and see that the light is on in her office. I hesitate for a long time, hoping nothing more than to not be hurt by her again. It's become a running theme in my life and I just want it to somehow end - somewhere.

I walk through the kitchen door and feel the welcome heat and smell of it, even now, long after baking is done for the day. The lights back here are dimmed. My father and brother are upstairs, probably. I hear a sound coming from the office though.

I open the door and she looks up from the desk, where she had lain her head on top of her folded arms. Her long hair is loose - it's a ragged mixture of blonde, dirty blonde and the streaks of gray that are starting at the roots. Her eyes and nose and mouth are all narrow - giving her a pinched-in look. Her face is blotchy and red from crying.

She makes a sound and I go to her. She starts to rise to meet me, but ends up collapsing and I catch her. Sobs like dry heaves come out of her and I fold her in me - I'm so much bigger than her now. For years, she's been too afraid to hit me. But also, afraid to touch me at all. Perhaps she felt she'd rescinded that right. Or tried to talk herself into believing that I wasn't worth it, to somehow make her own actions more justifiable.

I don't know and I don't give a shit right now.

* * *

The next morning I wake up bleary and exhausted from the trials of the night before. Mercifully, I was too worn out for nightmares. It's too late to bake bread and I couldn't possibly think of a thing I want to do less. I have to go see Katniss. I just don't even know what I will say or do.

Prim answers the door in her nightgown and robe - staying home from school today. She looks stricken, drained, and just - tired.

"Did she make it home last night?"

"Ye-ah," says Prim with a funny expression. "But it might be awhile before you can see her. She got drunk with Haymitch last night and - didn't have a great night, or morning. She's still asleep."

I roll my eyes. But I'm really pissed at Haymitch. He has no right to let her follow him down that hole. She has to get ready for the Games. The one thing we know is that she will be going back in. Therefore, we should be prepping her - we should be doing nothing but.

I spend the morning paying off Ripper, who sells white liquor out of her home, to keep from selling anything to Haymitch or Katniss; calling Effie, who sobs and sobs on the phone until I ask her to send me recordings of the Hunger Games for all the living victors; fending off sympathetic visitors who show up at my doorstep periodically. Delly and Lily cry; the guys stand around awkwardly. People bring me eggs, flowers - jars of preserves. Maybe I'm not as removed from District 12 as I thought.

In the afternoon, I go over to Haymitch's house when I know Hazelle is scheduled to be there, and with her help root out and empty every bottle of liquid I can find, while he groans and nurses his hangover in his bedroom. After scouring the upstairs, I go back downstairs to a rare and amusing sight - Haymitch and Katniss, sitting in the living room, sipping something hot out of mugs. I put a box of empty bottles on his dining room table and look at both of them. "There, it's done."

"What's done?" asks Katniss, her eyes widening.

"I've poured all the liquor down the drain."

Haymitch jumps up and reaches for the box like a drowning man. "You what?"

"I tossed the lot."

"He'll just buy more," says Katniss.

"No, he won't. I've got an arrangement with Ripper."

Haymitch turns to me and vaguely swipes toward me with his knife. I've sidestepped this maneuver before and I do so again without even thinking about it.

"What business is it of yours what he does?" asks Katniss angrily.

I look at her and meet her anger with my own. "It's completely my business. However it falls out, two of us are going to be in the arena again with the other as mentor. We can't afford any drunkards on this team. Especially not you, Katniss."

"What?" she sputters. "Last night's the only time I've ever even been drunk."

"Yeah, and look at the shape you're in."

She blinks and she's asking me, with her eyes, where is the boy with the ready arms to hold her, with the kisses she likes without admitting it? She'll eventually work it out, I hope. That boy threw the last games into confusion. Katniss can have no more emotional connections to the boy going with her into this arena.

Because I love her - now, more than ever - I have to put a halt to the closeness that has been growing between us. She did more than enough the first time, and she didn't even _like_ me that much then.

"Don't worry, I'll get you more liquor," she says to Haymitch.

"Then I'll turn you both in, let you sober up in the stocks."

"What's the point to this?" asks Haymitch.

"The point is that two of us are coming home from the Capitol. One mentor and one victor. Effie's sending me recordings of all the living victors. We're going to watch their Games and learn everything we can about how they fight. We're going to put on weight and get strong. We're going to start acting like Careers. And one of us is going to be victor again whether you two like it or not!"

I leave them to chew on that.

For the next couple of days, I walk into town to have breakfast with my family. Katniss' anger at me carries her over three mornings of going without her precious cheese buns before she finally cracks and calls me one evening.

"Come over for dinner," she says abruptly.

"Why?" I challenge her.

"Well, you're the one with the plans. You want to let the rest of us in on them or not?"

I grin into my phone. "Sure, I'll be right over."

I bring over my notebook and after dinner, the five of us sit around the table. "So," I begin. "I think that we can assume - right off - that any strategies, especially the one from last year, are not going to be sufficient on their own. Though we can't discard them entirely. I'm sorry, Katniss, but - unless you really don't feel like you can do it again - we probably should go in, for the sponsors at least, as the 'star-crossed lovers.'"

She blinks at me. "Of course."

"Anyway, then we can at least go in together - to protect each other - from the start."

This time she smiles a little when she nods.

"But we also need to train. We know now how brutal it can be, and all the weapons training I ever got was in the training center last year. I need more practice - and Katniss, you could use practice on hand-to-hand combat. And - Haymitch, I don't know how long it's been since you did anything other than swing at the air with that knife. And - we need to get back into shape."

That has their attention, and Katniss finally looks at me with something other than mild annoyance. "So - you have a plan for this?"

"Well, I've drafted a schedule, of sorts. Nothing complicated. Mornings we do strength and endurance training, alternating weight lifting and running. Afternoons we work on combat skills. I thought we could start on hand-to-hand, but also, Katniss, we would want to learn to climb trees, study up on plants, learn some trapping skills. I would like Gale to help here, if he doesn't mind giving up part of his Sundays."

"Gale?" she says doubtfully.

"You've always said he is better at snares than you."

"We could put you on a diet - for putting on weight," says Katniss' mother suddenly.

"Yes," I nod, scribbling that down in my notebook. "And finally, I got that box of tapes from Effie today. We should all sit down and - I know this isn't going to be pleasant - we should get to know the fighting styles, and also, you know, the thought processes of the other people who might be reaped with us. I know it might have changed, in the meanwhile, but I don't think it can hurt to know. Whatever else about this Quell, at least we have the forewarning of knowing roughly who our opponents will be."

After dinner, Katniss walks me and Haymitch out to the front porch. And we both watch Haymitch limp home. I give a sigh - I don't know how easy it will be to get Haymitch into shape, after twenty-five years of major neglect.

"What is it?" she asks me, looking at me closely. I know she's still waiting for something from me, some proclamation of the self-sacrifice I intend to make for her; some declaration of my never-ending love. But these things are already known. In the arena, when the time comes, will be the place for declarations. And once again, it will be completely true - and completely a strategy. Then one or both of us will be gone, and this strange game will finally be over.

"Nothing - Haymitch. I doubt we have the time to get him into arena shape."

She sets her mouth. "We'll have to make sure of it."

We look at each other and my resolve is tested. No big deal - this is going to happen. And I don't intend to withdraw from her entirely; no. The Capitol is ripping us apart forever, so I intend to enjoy her presence as much as possible. But as her ally.

"It might not be him," I shrug.

She's on the verge of saying something, but thinks better of it. It's funny how it always comes down to this. Like it was in the training center, when we were opponents straining against the pull of the friendship that was already flickering to life between us. Now we are at cross-purposes again and she knows and I know that if we talk too much about it - if we hash it all out: _Haymitch's life or mine -_ some things will be done and said that can't be undone, things that have no place given the future that we will never have. Things she will have to save for Gale.

"So, I guess I'll see you tomorrow," I say, at last. The days are growing longer and the sun is only just now beginning to set - the trees on the horizon are darkening into a smudgy line and the overlay of the soft orange light over the pale blue sky is creating streaks of violet and magenta around the molten glow of the sun. Beautiful. When I descend the steps of her porch and turn my feet in the direction of town and not my house, she stops me.

"Where are you going?"

"I'm going to meet some people at Aster's. Her birthday is today."

"Aster Linwood?" she asks with a slight frown.

"Yeah, she's a friend of mine. And - I'm trying to make it up to my friends. I haven't been a good one. I was so depressed and lonely and sorry for myself after the Games … now that I know that I don't have - that I might not have - much time left, that's something I have to make up."

I look up at her, trying to read her expression. I could take her with me. It's a party, she's my fiancée - in a normal world it would be a matter of course. But it's too close to dangerous territory, for her to go as - my date. And she would hate it, anyway.

"Oh, that makes sense," is all she says, then she goes inside.

We have roughly eight weeks until the Reaping, and it goes by with frightening speed. In order to not draw too much attention from the Peacekeepers, we jog around the perimeter of Victors' Village. We make weights out of old plastic containers and do our conditioning in my basement. There are 56 living victors, besides the three of us, so we watch a tape or two a day, going all the way back to the 11th Hunger Games, which was won by a sixteen-year-old girl who we realize with a start must be a survivor of the Dark Days. When I wonder out loud if Effie sent me the wrong tape, Haymitch grunts and says, no, it's not a mistake. She's still alive.

While I'm pleased with my and Katniss' progress, Haymitch's body resists the change and it is weeks before he can run laps without losing his breath. He's got no aim with his knife, is awkward with even the sticks we use to practice sword fighting, and finds wrestling to be a ridiculous chore. I'm glad I'm not going to have to rely on him to help Katniss in the arena, because I'd be getting pretty genuinely worried by now.

Gale does join us for three straight Sundays and teaches - as best as he can without being in the trees - how to string and set a variety of snares. Even Katniss pays close attention to this - despite years of spending time with him in the woods, she isn't nearly as good as he is.

Katniss is careful to hover around the two of us during these sessions. Maybe she's worried about words blowing up between us. And maybe he has some lingering resentment of my usurping whatever his relationship was with Katniss. _One kiss._ But he doesn't say anything. We are very polite to each other. My fight isn't really with him and his isn't with me. It's with Katniss, really, running away from the subject with such speed there's dust in our faces. And it's with the Capitol - throwing her and me together, and now forcing us apart.

I try to observe their behavior together and it's comfortable - she'll chuckle at something he says that only they know about; she's easy with her teasing and in expressing her frustration when he goes too fast - but it's not as close as I always imagine, at least not around me. They're not like a 'couple' - absently touching each other, standing close - nothing like the subtle things that lovers do in public when they're not even aware of it. This isn't exactly proof of anything, but I take a fragile sort of comfort in it.

One day, Katniss goes inside to use the bathroom, leaving Gale and me alone together, sitting in Haymitch's back yard, twine and sticks between us. I give him a sideways glance and say, "Don't worry. She'll come home again - and alone this time."

He grunts, finally looks up at me. It really is startling, the physical similarity to Katniss - the eyes, not only the exact same color, but also the same shape. The set look of the mouth. He's tall and broad where she is slight and short, but otherwise, they could be siblings, let alone cousins. "Do you really think the Capitol is going to let her come home?"

"I _have_ to believe it," I say. This is the thing I don't spend too much time thinking about, because there's nothing I can do about it. "I believe she can make it to the end. I don't know what happens after that, all I know is that she is going to win this Quell."

"Yeah."

But I'm looking down at my hands now, everything else blurring but my white fingers with their little burn scars. If I squint hard enough, I can still see the nightlock berries in my palm. "I wish she had just let me die. If she had just taken it - taken the victory - all of this would never have happened. She'd be safe, everyone would be safe."

"Huh. She's said exactly the same thing about herself."

I smile, but it hurts a little. "That sounds like her," I say shortly. "But silly. She had no real reason to save me over herself."

"Well -" he starts. But Katniss comes out with the slam of Haymitch's back door, hurrying over as if anxious about the small amount of time we've already spent alone together, and whatever he was going to say is lost to the moment.

Two nights before the Reaping, we finish the last tape at Haymitch's house. Just the three of us. The game tapes have kind of blurred together. There really are basically two types of games. Career years that follow the predictable pattern: alliance, hunt, break-up of alliance, final showdown. And non-Career years in which something unpredictable - usually something about the arena itself - favors some non-Career tribute and propels him or her to the end, with the Careers as often as not destroyed in an early accident or natural disaster. Our year I would have characterized as a typical Career year - except for Katniss, the unpredictable element.

"Well, that's that," I say, updating my notebook and glancing over at Katniss, who is picking at her fingernails. "I think that we've finally earned a break."

Haymitch's groan of relief makes both Katniss and I laugh.

"So, we have tomorrow off? Is that what you're saying?" Katniss asks me.

"Yes." It's Sunday tomorrow and I figure - I can go frost cakes one more time at the bakery and have dinner with my family. She can have her entire Sunday with Gale.

"So …"

We all sit in silence together. Haymitch's house. Which has become the perfectly fitting home for the dysfunctional family that the three of us are. I think of Haymitch living in this place alone for all of these years - a quarter of a century. I hope there are at least two of us left at the end of this. No one should have to be as alone as he has been.

Katniss and I leave together. We stand together on his porch and listen to the crickets, which make a riotous sound tonight. She looks fresh and healthy in the moonlight, and her eyes glow. I'm tempted again - to say something, to do something. But it's not time, yet. We hear Haymitch's phone ringing and we both jump, startled. I've never seen or heard him take a call.

"Probably Effie or something," says Katniss, with a chuckle that dies into a sigh.

The next day, after frosting as many cakes as make any kind of financial sense for the bakery - and a somber early supper with the extended family - I start to head home, but the thought of the empty house depresses me. So, first I take a walk, through town, toward the Seam - to the Meadow. It's full of dandelions in their later stages - all white and puffy. I pick one and blow away the spores, making my one and only wish.

That's when I see her. She's alone, sitting in the grass - staring at the fence that divides her from her woods, from freedom. I'm surprised she is alone. And I leave her alone, to say her good-byes.

I have one last task to do at home. I have accounted for everything else. What money I have left from my first year of Victor winnings will be released to my father once I am gone, and I have directed it to be secured for my cousins' upbringing. Most of my possessions have been packed away for easy removal, the instant I am killed in the arena. Just one thing remains. I box up all my paintings. On each box, I indicate the person I want to have the painting. My family, my closest friends - Katniss, of course, several for Katniss. Even one for Gale. It's not an original idea, but I just can't bear the thought of the Peacekeepers coming in and throwing them all away.

Reaping day is hot and sticky. I put on my favorite pants and t-shirt, sticking my notebook of tribute research in my front pocket. Then I pick up Haymitch and Katniss and her family and we walk together into town.

It's quiet, and far less 'festive' than normal. The town square is dusty, there are no new banners besides the one that was raised when Thread arrived. The Capitol cameras and sound systems have arrived. But there's no sense of scope or scale. The thin crowd that has already started to gather part for us when we walk through them, all staring at us sadly. Instead of the usual rows of teenagers before the stairs of the Justice Hall, there are two small roped off areas. One for Katniss, who stands alone. One for me and Haymitch.

The normal routine - the anthem, the history of Panem, the introduction of Effie Trinket, who comes out lacking her usual verve, though she is wearing a spectacular gold wig. There's no mentor - yet - to also take the stage, so that part is skipped. Then, soon enough, Effie is casting around inside the bowl that holds Katniss' name. Katniss walks, stone-faced, up to the stage and puts her chin up. And now I hold my breath, just hoping for one result. Because I'm not one hundred percent sure I can trust the man beside me to do what I asked. With relief, I hear his name, not mine. And as he walks up to the stage, I count to three and put my hand in the air.

"I volunteer as tribute," I say.

Like before, I look to Katniss' face for inspiration for my walk up the stage. But as she looks at me, her expression crumbles, and sadness fills it. So, I smile at her and mouth, "It's OK."

And when I look out at the crowd, not listening to the recitation of the Treaty, my 12-year-old cousin's face is the only one that really comes into focus. I silently wish her and the rest of them success in all the dreadful years to come, and then I'm whisked off the stage and back into the Games.


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter Fifteen**

* * *

The reaping ceremony done, Katniss, Haymitch, Effie and I are marched by Peacekeepers through the Justice Building - right out through the back to the waiting car. No hour to say good-bye to our friends and loved ones. It seems like nothing more than a spiteful act - no purpose to it. I think in horror of the last words I had been formulating in my head, and feel a moment of sheer gratitude that I had one good day with my mother, that I took care to hang out with my friends. As soon as she realizes what's happening, Katniss almost collapses, and immediately starts to cry.

On board the train, she runs to a window and presses her face to the glass, staring at 12 while it recedes - the train station pulling away, the fence line crossed, the surrounding hills and woods swallowing up the gray buildings of the town square. This is very different from last year, when her stoicism was something of a marvel to me. I'm a little worried. What if she can't get into the right headspace for the Games?

Or, I guess it's just my turn to be the calm one.

"We'll write letters, Katniss," I say. "It will be better, anyway. Give them a piece of us to hold on to. Haymitch will deliver them for us if … they need to be delivered."

She nods and heads off to her sleeping car. I turn to Effie. "Did you get that box of tapes back, Effie?"

"Yes, they're in the media car, dear. Do you still have some to watch?"

I shrug. "Rewatch, I guess. But after dinner."

I go to shower and change, then lie down on my bed for a while. I try to focus on the upcoming week. Learning who the reaped tributes are. What to focus on in the training center. What Caesar will ask me about this time. But all my thoughts return, again and again, to the last train trip. It's the sound of the tracks - that constant whir and the slight rocking - forcing me to remember the nights spent in her bed. The way her body curled up next to mine. After keeping a deliberate distance from her over the last couple of months, my defenses are way down.

At least now there is no real reason anymore for distance. Anything said or done from here to the end can be remembered by her as just part of the strategy. Home is left free of any associations with me except for the brief months of friendship. The train - the stage - the arena. These impermanent places of fake kisses and false promises. The nightmare land which is the only place I have ever been loved.

I take out the notebook and stare at my pages and pages of notes. But I'm pulled to a blank page, and - tentatively, cautiously - begin to draw, afraid of wolf mutts leaping out of my pencil. But instead I draw something from an old myth: the daughter of summer, emerging from the crack in the ground - the entrance to the underworld - to the fields where her mother waits with open arms. Damn, that would make a good subject for a painting, I think to myself, once it's almost done and Effie has interrupted me with her knock on the door, calling me to dinner. The verdant world, all greens and sun-drenched blues, coming to life in the foreground; and underneath it, just the peek at the orange fires in the darkness, the ashy fruits of the dead trees….

Effie and I sit across from the others at the dinner table, and the Katniss and Haymitch side of the table could not look more glum and subdued. While there is not the same striking similarity between them as there is between her and Gale, they are both remarkably alike in their expressions right now. As if storm clouds had faces. Haymitch refuses wine, with a little glare in my direction, then stares at his glass of water as if he could transform it to booze with the intensity of his gaze.

"I love your new hair, Effie," I say into the grim silence.

"Thank you! I had it especially done to match Katniss' pin. I was thinking we might get you a gold ankle band and maybe find Haymitch a gold bracelet or something so we could all look like a team."

I'm not sure Effie would be helping herself at all by closer association with us, but this seems harmless enough. "I think that's a great idea. What about it, Haymitch?"

He doesn't lift his eyes from his dinner plate. "Yeah, whatever."

"Maybe we could get you a wig, too," says Katniss, teasingly, and he glares at her.

We finish dinner in silence, then Effie says it's about time for the recap of the reapings. I go get my notebook and join everyone in the media car just as the anthem is starting up on the broadcast.

I have organized all the living victors' names in my notebook by district, so I can quickly check them off as they are called. Cashmere and Gloss - brother and sister tributes from District 1 and winner of consecutive games about eleven and twelve years ago, respectively. The first volunteer comes, naturally, from District 2, where Brutus - an imposingly muscular man in his early middle age - maybe 40 - replaces a boy who won just two years ago. Enobaria - who I think maybe won the first game I remember watching, when I was three or four - is reaped next. Anyway, she is beloved in the Capitol and is constantly being interviewed, so I know her well. She was pinned to the ground when she ripped her attacker's throat out with her teeth (a detail I had forgotten – or blocked – until we rewatched the games). They are now filed and tipped with gold, a tribute to her most famous action. Like her district partner, she looks to be in extremely good shape and almost eager to be a part of it all again.

The careers are rounded off by Finnick Odair - easily the most famous Victor until Katniss and I came along - who won ten years ago, but is still only in his early twenties, and Mags, an extremely old woman who volunteers in place of Annie, the girl who won five years ago, almost by accident, and seemed - at least according to her interviews - to have gone a bit insane since then. Mags is the one whose tape I thought we got by mistake and I can't believe it as she hobbles up to the stage, using a cane. She looks like any regular old exertion will kill her, let alone the arena. This is crazy.

There's one other recent winner among the tributes - Johanna Mason from 7, who won the year after Annie did, and is all scowls as she takes her place on the stage. Apart from that, all the other victors reaped again today seem to be in their thirties and up, with several other elderly tributes and most of them not in nearly the shape of Brutus. Except for the District 11 tributes, who, unhappily, are among Haymitch's closest friends, especially Chaff, the tall, strong man I remember seeing with Haymitch on the Tour. Even so - Chaff looks to be near 50, and he's missing his left hand. His partner, Seeder, is at least ten years older.

Haymitch and Effie both sigh and make some small, unhappy comments as the reapings go on. I realize that in order to get through this, Katniss and I may have to actually kill off some of Haymitch's friends. That old panic - my distaste for killing - rises up in me again, but I mentally squash it. I'm going to have to do better than that, this year.

After the reaping broadcast concludes, Haymitch goes moodily off to bed, and Effie follows shortly afterward. I stare down at my notes and am keenly aware that Katniss is looking at me. So, I start pulling out the pages of victors who were not reaped, trying not to remember working on the plant book with her, feeling her stare at me ….

"Why don't you get some sleep," I finally say.

"What are you going to do?"

"Just review my notes for a while. Get a clear picture of what we're up against. But I'll go over it with you in the morning." I look up at her and try to smile. "Go to bed, Katniss."

When she goes, I pop Gloss' game into the tape player, with the thought of skimming each of the Career's games tonight, just to remind myself of their fighting styles. By the time I get to Brutus, I'm already a little tired of the exercise, and there's not much to learn about him, anyway. A typical Career in a typical Career year. He seems to like swords and also breaking people's necks. There's such a resemblance to Cato that I wonder uneasily if he's a relative. Well. We'd be enemies under any circumstances in the arena, now. But I've always dreaded my betrayal of the careers coming back to haunt me.

I lose focus after a while and go back to finishing my sketch. I figure I can give it to Portia - kind of a parting gift. Time passes quickly in this exercise, and by the time I hear the noise of someone joining me in the compartment, Brutus' three-hour broadcast is three-quarters over.

It's Katniss, now in a robe over her shorts and t-shirt. She looks sick and troubled. The tape is just about to the part where Brutus kills his district partner after a long sword fight, so I get up and turn it off. "Couldn't sleep?" I ask her.

"Not for long,"

Her face reflects the receding nightmares, a silent accusation that I was not there to protect her from them.

"Want to talk about it?"

She swallows and shakes her head, and at last I relent, holding out my arms to her. She steps into them at once and wraps her arms around my neck so tightly that she brings my head down toward hers. I bury my face in her long, loose hair and my lips are on her neck. Her skin is cool and soft. I feel her breath get heavier against me, the rise and fall of her chest. My body comes to life as if it's been hibernating for all these months, and its hunger rises like blood. I wait for her to pull away, because I'm not going to be able to let her go, but she makes no move to break the embrace.

A Capitol attendant arrives and forces us to part. He's carrying a tray with a jug and two mugs. I smell warm milk and cinnamon. "I brought an extra cup," he tells Katniss.

"Thanks," she says, as he sets it down on the coffee table in front of the TV.

"And I added a touch of honey to the milk. For sweetness. And just a touch of spice." The man - a small little man with a thin, little mustache and watery eyes - looks at us with a wistful expression, shakes his head and goes.

"What's with him?"

I ease myself down on the couch and angle myself carefully. "I think he feels bad for us," I say, not adding that he's clearly a fan of the star-crossed lovers saga.

"Right," she grumbles, sitting next to me and pouring milk into the cups.

"I mean it. I don't think the people in the Capitol are going to be all that happy about our going back in. Or the other victors. They get attached to their champions."

"I'm guessing they'll get over it once the blood starts flowing," she replies, dryly. And I don't argue, because, really - what is my proof? We'll never know, anyway. But I file away the thought for later use. I'm fairly adept at working the sympathies of the Capitol crowd - maybe something can be done with it.

"So, are you watching all the tapes again?"

"Not really. Just sort of skipping around to see people's different fighting techniques."

"Who's next?"

"You pick."

She digs through the box of tapes, finally pulling one out and blinking at it with a curious expression. She holds it out towards me - it's Haymitch's game. "We never watched this one."

I shake my head. "No. I knew Haymitch didn't want to. The same way we didn't want to watch ours. And since we're on the same team, I didn't think it mattered much."

"Is the person who won in twenty-five in here?"

"I don't think so. Whoever it was must be dead by now, Effie only sent me victors we might have to face." I take the tape from her and consider it for a while. I've always been curious, and it seems she is too. "Why? Do you think we should watch it?"

She shrugs. "It's the only Quell we have. We might pick up something valuable about how they work. We don't have to tell Haymitch we saw it."

I ponder this, thinking of Haymitch's ravaged expression. _By killing kids._ It might be a mistake to watch. But … "OK," I agree.

I'm rewarded for my agreement by her curling up against me - just as she did in our victory interviews last year, when she was desperately trying to prove that she loved me - in order to watch. I'm not sure how I'll ever be able to concentrate on the tape, but, in fact, it turns out to be pretty compelling viewing.

First off, the announcement of the Quell, featuring a much younger President Snow - but even then at least 15 years into his reign - reminds me of what Haymitch said about the vacuum of smart, strategic, moral people at the head of the government. And then I wonder how Haymitch could possibly know that. Do the mentors have some way of getting a hold of that kind of information during the games? Not just mentors - any former Victor can spend the summer in the Capitol during the games, like Finnick Odair - legendarily romancing Capitol sponsors and other VIPs, whether he is mentoring or not.

Then we get to the reapings, which take twice as long and - though I was aware of it beforehand - are actually mind-boggling with the sheer numbers of tributes. District 12's reaping includes three Seam kids - and one Townie, a familiar-looking blonde girl called Maysilee Donner.

"Oh!" says Katniss, suddenly, straightening up. "She was my mother's friend."

"I think that's your mother hugging her," I say softly.

Katniss stares, open mouthed, at three blonde girls on the screen. They are all 16 or 17 - her mother, Maysilee and another girl, who looks like she might be Maysilee's twin. "Madge," she breathes.

"That's her mother," I say, two thoughts suddenly connecting in my head. "She and Maysilee were twins or something. My dad mentioned it once - Madge's aunt died in the games."

"The mockingjay pin," says Katniss, her expression showing that some new knowledge is just dawning on her. "It was _hers._ Madge gave it to me. Insisted I wear it."

I'm just starting to think through this startling information when the two boys from the Seam are reaped - the second one being Haymitch. He's cocky, straight-backed - so young. Although from the Seam, he appears to be well-fed and strong. And with his curly dark hair and those silver Seam eyes, surprisingly good looking.

"Oh, Peeta - you don't think he killed Maysilee, do you?" asks Katniss, upset.

"With forty-eight players? I'd say the odds are against it." But now I'm dreading it myself.

There are so many tributes that we get only the vaguest introductions to them - long shots of the chariot rides, a snippet or two of training - a glimpse of their interviews with Caesar. Even the Career pack gets shorter shrift than usual. Since this is Haymitch's games, he gets a lot of face time, of course. He's solitary and aloof in the training center, snarky and arrogant in his interview.

The arena is gorgeous - gorgeous and deadly on its own. All the plants and the water are poisonous; even the most benign-looking muttation - butterfly, squirrel, candy-colored bird - is lethal. On the fourth day, a volcano erupts, killing twelve players. It's the perfect example of a non-career game, designed no doubt to kill tributes at double speed so that the whole thing doesn't take too long. After the eruption, only thirteen of the forty-eight tributes remain. But that takes the advantage away from the careers and gives it to smarter players - like Haymitch. Haymitch, who was wary of the mountain from day one, always moving away from it. He gets a pack of supplies at the cornucopia that includes enough food to sustain him, as he eats it very sparingly. He sticks to the woods on the opposite side of the arena, and he is constantly moving in one direction, refusing to be turned aside - at least for very long.

On day 6, he reaches the end of the woods and finds a thick growth of hedges separating him from what looks like an open plain. The hedges turn him around and he goes back into the woods, running into three of the careers. He pulls out a knife and - I can't help smiling at this despite what is about to happen - swings it in a familiar way as he lunges straight into combat. This Haymitch is younger, stronger, quicker, more determined to save his own skin, and he has his first two kills almost right away, stabbing one career in the throat and the other up the gut in seconds. But the third disarms him and is about to cut his throat with his own knife when he drops to the ground, a dart in his back.

This comes courtesy of Maysilee herself who - to the profound astonishment of both Katniss and myself - has proved every bit as cunning as Haymitch. Her own pack of supplies included a set of darts - one of the truly perfect weapons for this arena. Where a Townie girl picked up the aim and arm strength for it, I'll never know, but she uses the lethal poisons from some bright blue flowers to turn her darts into extremely effective weapons. Before she even runs into Haymitch, she has killed three tributes with the things. I think of Madge learning archery from Katniss and my whole opinion of the Donner-Undersee family undergoes a tremendous shift.

"We'd live longer with the two of us," she says coolly, to Haymitch.

"Guess you just proved that. Allies?"

I sneak a glance at Katniss. It's like I can see the origins of Haymitch's strategy with us forming in front of my eyes. It's a relief - it makes them instantly more rootable - to see the tributes from both sides of the District 12 divide team up in that instant, unhesitatingly. But to link two district partners together is a risky scheme. Such an alliance cannot be easily broken without repercussions - at least it's understood this way back in 12. It's smart, at the outset, to be in an alliance with someone you can almost completely trust. But come to the end of the arena, the alliance must be broken and, unless you're a Career - for whom alliances are made to be broken - a horrible choice awaits you. As Katniss and I well know. I start to get very nervous about the outcome of this game.

But at first, it works out well. They split the weapons and food from the Career packs, sleep in shifts, figure out how to collect rainwater. Twice they run into individual tributes, who stand no chance against his speed and her lethal darts. Haymitch continues his quest to get beyond the woods, and this is their one area of disagreement.

"Why?" she asks him.

And then Haymitch says the most radical thing I've ever heard said in the arena, and possibly one of the main reasons this game has never, to my knowledge, re-aired. "Because it has to end somewhere, right? The arena can't go on forever."

"What do you expect to find?"

"I don't know. But maybe there's something we can use." But I can tell by his evasive tone that he doesn't mean that - not exactly. He's planning to find a way to step straight out of the arena, if he can - out to whatever surrounds it. Maybe I am good at seeing the big picture, I guess, but this thought never even occurred to me last year. To me - the arena felt like the entire world, unending, where I was under constant surveillance. Where the Gamemakers controlled the weather, activated traps to pull us all together to battle, sent mutts after us, refused to let us win together. But the arena, in reality, is finite - and outside it, who knows?

Haymitch acquired a blow torch from the careers who attacked him and now he returns to the hedges and patiently blasts his way through them, while Maysilee stands guard - despite her protestations. She has a point. By this time, they are very near the end, and even ignore a call to a feast that leaves all but three other tributes dead.

On the other side of the hedges, they find themselves on a hard, flat cliff. It's a sheer-looking cliff, and very high - the canyon far below them is covered in jagged rocks.

"That's all there is, Haymitch. Let's go back."

And part of me agrees with her, wholeheartedly. They are more than capable of taking out the last three opponents. But - then what? The great dilemma of the games. That the Capitol is not content with merely pitting the districts against each other. No, they force the district tributes to turn on each other. Friend against friend. Brother against sister, even. Two lovers. Because - why encourage cooperation, in any form? Alliances are too dangerous for the people in power.

Haymitch refuses to leave. He hasn't hunted anyone - only killing when attacked - and he's not about to start now. Not when there's a puzzle to solve. So, it's up to her to break the alliance.

"All right. There's only five of us left. May as well say good-bye now, anyway. I don't want it to come down to you and me."

"OK," he agrees, and, though I'm sad that he doesn't protest or even look at her when she leaves him, I'm so relieved to know that their final confrontation is much less likely now, that I almost cheer him.

Haymitch fixates on the cliff. He walks up and down the rim, as if looking for a place on the rock face that might be climbable. At one point, he accidentally kicks a small rock down into the canyon, and he watches it as it falls. Then he sits down, still determined to figure this out, when the pebble comes flying back up the canyon. With a manic smile, he grabs a larger rock and throws it over the cliff. This, too, returns to him, and he starts to laugh.

It's at that moment that Maysilee's screams ring throughout the air, echoing against the canyon walls. Without hesitation, Haymitch runs toward the sound and finds her dying in the woods, a victim of a flock of pink birds with long, razor-sharp beaks - many of which lay dead around her, felled by her darts. She never regains consciousness, and Haymitch holds her hand in silence until the cannon sounds.

The camera then switches to the last of the career tributes, one of the girls from District 1, who kills one of the last of the other two tributes by the cornucopia and tracks down the second in the woods, just before he is killed by squirrels. She finds the burned hedges that mark Haymitch's trail and pursues him, back into the woods, forcing him into close-range combat - his knife against her axe. This part is hard to watch. He receives catastrophic wounds in his gut and his last-ditch attempt at throwing his knife at her takes out her eye, but doesn't kill her. As she staggers around for a moment, in what must be incomprehensible pain, he makes his escape - back to the cliff. When she finally resumes her pursuit of him, he is nearly done, anyway. His blood is seeping through the hands that are covering his belly wound. When she throws her axe at him, he doesn't so much dodge the weapon as collapse to the ground at the exact right time. Her axe goes over the cliff edge and she stands there, holding her hands to her face while he starts convulsing. He's probably got minutes left when the axe returns and lodges itself right in her head. She's dead at once, making Haymitch the winner of the games, though their haste in retrieving him from the cliff seems none too soon.

I click off the tape and Katniss and I spend a minute absorbing what we've seen.

"That force field at the bottom of the cliff," I say at last. "It was like the one on the roof of the training center, the one that throws you back if you try to jump off it and commit suicide. Haymitch found a way to turn it into a weapon."

"Not just against the other tributes, but the Capitol, too. You know they didn't expect that to happen. It wasn't meant to be part of the arena. They never planned on anyone using it as a weapon. It made them look stupid that he figured it out. I bet they had a good time trying to spin that one."

I contemplate her words. To me, it is not his use of it as a weapon, but the fact that he thought to look for a boundary at all, that strikes me as the thing the Capitol would like the least. But she may be right.

"Bet that's why I don't remember seeing it on television," she continues. "It's almost as bad as us and the berries!"

She starts laughing hysterically. She's right, there. He refused to play the game. When it came down to it, the last blow struck in the Quarter Quell was the girl's own fatal miss.

"Almost, but not quite," says a voice behind us, and we both jump, guiltily. It's Haymitch, just standing there, smirking at us. He's got a bottle of wine and takes a big drink of it. Well - we were the ones who broke the silent bargain of not watching his tape. So, I guess we can't complain about it.


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter Sixteen**

* * *

The chatter of my prep team dies down when I enter my room in the Remake Center, freshly showered. I've got the usual towel tied around my waist - and they just saw me a few months ago - so I don't know why they're staring at me like this.

"Miss me?" I say, lightly.

"Oh, you poor thing," says Calla.

"Yeah, well," I reply awkwardly.

"Look at you," says Antonia. "You're - ."

I look down at myself. "What? What is it?"

"You're hot," says Julia, brusquely. "What have you been doing to yourself since the last time we saw you?"

Oh. I look down at myself again. I had forgotten - two months of running and weight training. I do have some more - definition, it's true. I was in pretty good shape last year, having just come off a year of wrestling, but I'm leaner, now - some of the weight I lost in the arena never did come back - and they like that here.

"And your arms are so brown," Julia adds, now frowning a little as she approaches me. "We're going to have to darken up your - torso - to match. And your upper legs I'm guessing."

"Poor you," Antonia teases her.

My blush spreads over every inch of me, brown or white.

"Behave, ladies," says Calla. "This isn't the time for that. Well - Peeta - you should - get on the table, now."

Then follows the longest prep session ever. This time, since I have to be toned, I'm waxed. Then bronzed. Rubbed all over with some shiny lotion. Last year, they barely looked or talked to me - just did the work and chatted among themselves. Now - since they've broached the subject - I'm painfully aware of my body under their hands, and every casual remark they make to me seems loaded with innuendo. As soon as they release me, I scramble directly for the robe that is laid out on a nearby chair and sit down, folding my arms.

"It's such a pity," I hear one of them say as they depart, and Portia enters. "He could have made such a killing."

"Hush, he's engaged, remember…?"

Portia comes over and I stand to greet her. She doesn't say anything, at first, just presses her forehead against mine for a moment.

"That took a while," she said.

"I made the mistake of getting a partial tan this summer," I respond, pulling up the sleeve of my robe to check out the matching upper and lower arms.

"Ah."

"Portia … what were they talking about?"

She hesitates and for a second I'm sure that she's going to make something up, but she just says, "Just that - you're very handsome and - that can pay well, here."

I blink. "Aren't there enough victors - in that profession, already?"

"What's ever enough?" she sighs.

After a silence, I say, "Are you setting us on fire again this year?"

She grins. "Not exactly. I can't wait for you to see it, though - you'll love it. You want lunch?"

After lunch, Portia and I just talk about random stuff. What kind of house does she live in? If she HAD to live in a district - if she HAD to - which one? Then it's time to go. She herself, not Julia, applies my make-up. She puts me in a black unitard very like last year's outfit and tops it with a half crown, a tribute to my co-victory of the 74th Games. This outfit, though, is powered from within. When the power is on, it starts to glow like an ember with orange-red light. The light shifts and waxes and wanes so realistically, I gape at it. The crown glows too, casting shadows on my face, which is already dark with black on my eyelids and on my lips. I look strange and sinister, so unlike myself.

"It's amazing, Portia."

She shows me how to turn it off. "Let's leave that off until you're on the chariot. Conserve the battery. What we want from you this year, Peeta, is to be very aloof and above it all. Don't engage the audience. Don't even look at the audience."

I nod.

"Go ahead." She smiles. "I think Katniss already went down."

Feeling weird - last year we were escorted everywhere - I go down to the first floor of the Remake center, which is a wide, open space with concrete floors and high ceilings. The chariots are here and they are already in formation. The tributes, though, are spread about - clustered in small groups and talking to each other. Even Katniss - I see her already standing by our chariot and in close conversation with another tribute. By her stance, she's a little uncomfortable and I soon see why. Her companion is a young man, naked except for a glittery wrap around his waist. Finnick Odair, the sex symbol of Panem.

He gives Katniss a slight bow and leaves her before I reach her. I can see the slight look of disgust on her face as he turns his back.

"What did Finnick Odair want?" I ask her.

She turns to me and leans in. Her face, like mine, is heavily made up, and she looks fierce and terrifying - probably pulls it off quite a bit better than I do. She puts her lips right near mine and lowers her eyes. "He offered me sugar and wanted to know my secrets," she says in a seductive tone that just doesn't suit her, but that quickens my blood, anyway.

"Ugh," I say, glancing at Finnick's retreating back. "Not really."

"Really," she says. "I'll tell you more when my skin stops crawling."

I look at her and consider how - how _virginal_ she still is, despite everything she's been forced to do or to pretend. It's such a contrast to the huntress side of her - the pragmatic killer I know her to be. She'd probably as happily skin me as even talk about sex with me. I know I've never dared to bring it up. All those nights on the train. And - as far as I can tell - it doesn't seem to have ever even occurred to her.

Which I kind of like. I don't know why – it's not very flattering to me, if I think about it too closely – maybe it's because it's one of her few areas of vulnerability, one of the few things about her I can feel legitimately protective of, even if I'm just protecting her from myself. No, that's not quite right. Anyway, Katniss needs no particular protection that I can provide better than she can for herself. Which might bother other guys, I guess, but really doesn't me and never has. It might be more that, around her, I don't need to be anybody but my real self; there is no need or reason to put on some act - puffed up and macho or smooth and seductive. We've been all the way to the brink of death and back together. She knows what I am - I know what she is. There is a sort of safety in having finally figured out the exact geography of our relationship: both the infinity of it and its very specific limitations. Or, to boil it down to simple terms, my boundless desire for her and her unreadiness for sex. I may have once wished for a different vista, but I have become comfortable traversing this terrain.

But I have to admit it. In my more - selfish – moments, I've wished she was ready to … just once …

I shake my head clear of that. Maybe it's my preps. And Finnick. And the fact that the other tributes are all adults - and none of us are innocents. And the sultry air. But there's something different in the atmosphere tonight. "Do you think we'd have ended up like this if only one of us had won? Just another part of the freak show?"

"Sure. Especially you," she says.

I smile at that. "Oh? And why especially me?"

"Because you have a weakness for beautiful things and I don't," she sniffs - but there's a glimmer in her eye. "They would lure you into their Capitol ways and you'd be lost entirely."

A shiver runs through me, and I can't locate the source of it. It's hot tonight. "Having an eye for beauty isn't the same as a weakness," I reply. "Except possibly when it comes to you."

I see a look on her face that I haven't seen since we were alone and desperately flirting with each other in the cave - her for the sponsors, me for real. Half pleased, half panicked. Unsure of how to respond. I grin at her, taking the edge off of the flirtation, and the music starts up anyway, the wide doors of the Remake Center opening on to the Avenue. "Shall we?" I offer my hand to her and help her up into the chariot.

She pulls me up after her and looks me up and down. "Hold still," she says, and straightens the crown. "Have you seen your suit turned on? We're going to be fabulous again."

"Absolutely. But Portia says we're to be very above it all. No waving or anything." I rake the room for any sign of our stylists. "Where are they, anyway?"

"I don't know." She follows my eyes. The District 4 chariot has already exited on to the Avenue. "Maybe we'd better switch ourselves on." We do, and I watch her curiously, to see how the costume looks on her. Last year, her flame costume pushed me right over the edge from crush to serious obsession. Perhaps she's right about me. … This year, there is no costume that can elevate how I feel about her. And anyway, I will always hold up in my mind the unearthly vision I had of her in the arena, under the influence of blood loss and mental trauma - gaunt-faced and wide eyed, her tiny hands holding death - as the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. The icon I will follow to the end. But there's definitely something sexy in the powerful smudge of her darkened eyelids and eyebrows, her face flickering under the glow of her costume as if she was standing in fire, throwing off sparks.

"Are we supposed to hold hands this year?" she asks.

"I guess they left it up to us."

She looks up to me now and meets my eyes. For a moment, everything around us fades away, just slightly. The crowd is mute, the music of the anthem muddled. It's not love or desire in the look she gives me. It's something even deeper than these. It's the allegiance that bound us together in the last arena, even to the defiance of the Capitol's game - an allegiance that goes down to the bones of the earth. There's a little bit of reproach in her eyes that makes me regret my flirtation. In that moment, I know down deep - not just intellectually - that she plans to sacrifice herself for me. That she knows our bond will not survive this next arena, but that she will _again_ refuse to leave without me. And in that moment, I know that I - with my self-pity, my petty jealousies and teenage boy lusts - am not worth it. And that I will never leave that arena without her.

Without further discussion, without even a flicker of change in her expression, we reach out and take each other's hands.

* * *

Katniss and I disembark at the Training Center and there we find Portia and Cinna waiting for us. Haymitch is here, too, but he's talking to the District 11 tributes. Once he sees us, he heads over, bringing them along. In person, Chaff is even taller and more imposing than Thresh, except for the missing hand. Seeder is much shorter, and her hair is streaked with gray, but she's got lean muscles and a no-nonsense expression.

She hugs me, and then Katniss, and she seems to whisper something in Katniss' ear that makes her smile. Then Chaff throws an arm around Katniss and bends down to kiss her on the mouth. She jumps back with an expression of extreme shock and both Chaff and Haymitch laugh at her. I think Haymitch better warn his friend about who Katniss is likely to now target first in the arena.

Katniss and I, along with Chaff and Seeder, are urged toward the elevators by the Peacekeepers, who seem to be tired of all the dawdling victors. Katniss takes my hand again and I squeeze it. There's a rustling sound behind us, as of someone running in a heavy dress, and then a girl appears at Katniss' side. As she walks, she's pulling off her headdress of branches and leaves. As we stand before the elevator doors, waiting, I take a good look at her. Johanna Mason. She's probably the youngest victor here, aside from me and Katniss. When she won just a couple of years ago, it was by infamously pretending to be weepy and afraid during her interview, hiding up in trees for most of the games, and then using an axe to kill off her last competitors - all tears, and any emotion, really, gone. She has dark, spiky hair and large brown eyes.

"Isn't my costume awful?" she asks Katniss, who immediately freezes - as she does whenever she's approached by assertive strangers. "My stylist's the biggest idiot in the Capitol. Our tributes have been trees for forty years under her. Wish I'd gotten Cinna. You look fantastic."

Katniss' expression closes up. "Yeah," she says stiffly. "He's been helping me design my own clothing line. You should see what he can do with - velvet."

"I have. On your tour. That strapless number you wore in District Two? The deep blue one with the diamonds? So gorgeous I wanted to reach through the screen and tear it right off your back."

Katniss inches a little closer to me and doesn't respond. Johanna, undeterred, unzips her brown, bark-patterned dress and wriggles out of it, kicking it away from herself in disgust. I look away quickly as I realize that she is now completely naked, except for her shoes.

The five of us enter the elevator together, and the glass walls reflect the orange light still glowing off of our costumes. I try to find something interesting to look at on the ceiling.

"Peeta, right?"

I look down at Johanna and smile. I'm very careful not to look down below her mouth; still, her breasts are definitely in my peripheral vision. "Yes?"

"Loved your paintings. That one with the mutts? It's like I was watching it again."

"Thanks."

"Do you do portraits?"

I blink. "Not so far."

"Too bad, I've always wanted to get one done. Too late now, I guess."

She glances at Katniss and then winks at me, and suddenly I get it. And I grin. She gets off on the 7th floor and I venture a glimpse at Katniss' stormy face. I manage to hold it in until Chaff and Seeder get off on 11, then I burst out laughing.

"What?" she says, letting go of my hand. Our elevator stops and the door opens.

"It's you, Katniss. Can't you see?"

"What's me?"

I step out of the elevator into our suite and wait for her to follow me. She's so endearingly pissed off. "Why they're all acting like this. Finnick with his sugar cubes and Chaff kissing you and that whole thing with Johanna." I try to wipe my smile off my face as her scowl deepens. "They're playing with you because you're so … you know."

"No, I don't know."

I cast around for a good way to explain. "It's like when you wouldn't look at me naked in the arena, even though I was half dead. You're so … pure."

Her flush burns through her makeup. "I am not!" she says indignantly. "I've been practically ripping your clothes off every time there's been a camera for the last year!"

Huh. If only. How to tell her that there is a way that some girls can just edge up to a boy and look like they know exactly what they are doing - while some girls can look so awkward even when they are accepting kisses on bare shoulders? "Yeah, but … I mean, for the Capitol, you're pure. For me, you're perfect. They're just teasing you."

"No, they're laughing at me, and so are you!"

My smile has nothing to do with that - it's more that she suddenly cares about it. That she doesn't like people thinking of her as inexperienced. And that she's jealous - and that's probably as unexpected to her as it is to me. But that line of reasoning will go nowhere fast, so I'm just going to have to let her be pissed off for a while, I guess.

The other elevator opens on Haymitch and Effie, who are both smiling. Then Haymitch steps off the elevator and glowers at something behind us.

I whip around and my heart sinks.

"Looks like they've got you a matched set this year," says Effie, horribly.

She means the Avoxes, our servants in the Training Center. There's the red-headed girl from last year who Katniss met a long time ago. And a red-headed man we both know. Darius, the Peacekeeper who was punished for trying to help Gale.


	17. Chapter 17

**Chapter Seventeen**

* * *

Haymitch grabs Katniss' wrist in anticipation of her reaction, but, after a highly-charged moment in which we are all frozen in place, she shakes him off and runs to her room. I'm staring transfixed at the young man who I didn't know that well, and, yes, he was a Peacekeeper - but still, he belonged to 12 and - this - a permanent dismemberment of his voice - seems like a brutally unjust punishment. I make a move - I don't know if it's toward Darius, or to get past him, maybe, but Haymitch says, "Watch it boy, we're all in enough trouble as it is."

Speaking to the Avoxes, unless in relationship to their assigned serving responsibilities, is forbidden in the Training Center. I just gape at Darius and shake my head sorrowfully, until Haymitch pushes me into the suite.

I go back to my room - it's down the hall from Katniss', separated by the two rooms Haymitch and Effie will be using - switch and pull off my costume and take a shower. The oily lotions dribble off my skin.

Katniss' dinner freeze-out is so remarkably familiar that sometimes during the meal I wonder if haven't just dreamed all of the past year. While everyone talks about the opening ceremonies and the success we were again, I just look at Katniss, and she just looks at her food - shutting me, shutting everyone out again. When we watch the Reaping, she makes a point of sitting far away from me and saying nothing at all until it's over and she formally thanks Portia and Cinna for their work. Then heads back to her bedroom.

I don't know what she wants from me - to take back what happened on the elevator - to take back what happened to Darius? Everything impossible, but nonetheless, I have to try. I follow her back and knock on her bedroom door, but there's no response.

My dreams that night are not so much the standard nightmares, but unpleasant dreams … well, not even unpleasant - uneasy, perhaps. There's a lot of nudity, some of it pleasant enough (Johanna's not bad to look at, in dreams or real life) - some of it uncomfortable, like walking around and realizing I'm not wearing any clothes. I think my dream is mostly spent trying to keep Katniss from entering a room before I can find my clothes, but when I wake up, the details slip away and I just wonder if I'm really gross, or if I'm just too gross for Katniss, or if it's just all a natural result of the overload of suggestiveness from yesterday. I wake with an erection, which makes me think I should feel worse about the whole thing - or maybe it's just a regular old morning hard on. Who knows? All I know is that, just when I needed to talk to someone about this sort of stuff, I was isolated from my parents and friends, and the one person left to confide in is the one person who can't hear any of it.

Anyway, it doesn't really matter, does it? To what end now would I be able to use such advice? Or really have to care what is "gross" or what is natural? In less than two weeks, I will be dead.

After showering, I go out and meet Haymitch and Effie for breakfast. Katniss remains stubbornly barricaded in her room and Haymitch's temperature rises visibly with every fifteen minutes that pass without her presence. Finally, Effie gets up to leave.

"I was hoping you'd be in a better mood for this," she says, delicately coughing. "But I've got that bangle for you." She hands Haymitch a small box, which he takes with a frown. "Because we're a team, yes? Now I just have to find something for Peeta," she concludes, with a smile.

"Maybe not an ankle bracelet," I tell her.

"Maybe a locket - you can carry a picture of Katniss into the arena."

Conflicting emotions clutch at me - the lovesick kid in me thinks the idea is kind of cool; the more realistic boy winces at the idea of Katniss ever finding out about such a thing. Mortifying. But …. "Sure," I say to Effie. "That might work." It fits the script, at any rate.

Haymitch pulls out a gold bangle that's accented with flames and is really like a cuff more than a bracelet. He grimaces, but, to my surprise, goes ahead and puts it on.

He and I wait through the rest of the eight o'clock hour for Katniss … then nine o'clock comes and that's when his face starts transitioning from red to purple. Training starts at ten, so she is definitely cutting things close. At nine-thirty, he goes down the hall and pounds on her door, demanding she get out immediately. Even so, it's five minutes before she joins us.

"You're late," he snarls at her.

"Sorry," she says, looking down at the table. "I slept in after the mutilated tongue nightmares kept me up half the night."

He scowls - but the scowl melts away until his expression is merely sad. This is a difference from last year. "All right, never mind. Today, in training, you've got two jobs. One, stay in love."

"Obviously," she retorts.

Or - why bother even telling her this? I almost say out loud. I'll stay in love, she'll tolerate it - that's what he really means.

"And two," he continues, "make some friends."

"No. I don't trust them, I can't stand any of them, and I'd rather operate with just the two of us."

Well, at least I'm still part of the equation. "That's what I said at first, but -."

"But it won't be enough," concludes Haymitch. "You're going to need more allies this time around."

"Why?"

"Because you're at a distinct disadvantage. Your competitors have known each other for years. So who do you think they're going to target first?"

"Us. And nothing we're going to do is going to override any old friendship. So why bother?"

"Because you can fight. You're popular with the crowd. That could still make you desirable allies, but only if you let the others know you're willing to team up with them.

"You mean you want us in the Career pack this year?" she asks in disbelief.

"That's been our strategy," he counters. "To train like Careers. And who makes up the Career pack is generally agreed upon before the Games begin. Peeta barely got in with them last year."

"So, we're to try to get in with Finnick and Brutus?" she says, with distaste. "Is that what you're saying?"

"Not necessarily. Everyone's a victor. Make your own pack if you'd rather - choose who you like. I'd suggest Chaff and Seeder. Although Finnick's not to be ignored. Find someone to team up with who might be of some use to you. Remember, you're not in a ring full of trembling children anymore. These people are all experienced killers, no matter what shape they appear to be in."

While I watch the conflict in Katniss' face, I wonder if I should argue the point with Haymitch. That Katniss doesn't feel - neither do I, for that matter - like making allegiances that can only end in betrayal. But I can't challenge Haymitch. Not when it comes to the Games. Not when it comes to getting Katniss to the end of them.

"All right, I'll try," she says sullenly.

Effie arrives again to accompany us down to the training center gym, but Haymitch nixes it. We're already the youngest competitors there, we don't have to arrive with a babysitter. So, she just walks us over to the elevator, fussing over us and our matching training outfits, and pushes the basement floor button for us.

On the way down, Katniss takes my hand, but she doesn't say anything. I just love the silent treatment.

When we get down to the gym, we find ourselves alone there except for the District 2 tributes, Brutus and Enobaria who, so far, are the only tributes I've actually seen take this whole thing seriously - aside from us. They're reacquainting themselves with the equipment available when it turns ten and Atala, the woman in charge of training, rattles off the rules and timeframes, same as she does every year. Maybe half of the tributes have even volunteered to show.

"Let's split up and cover more territory," Katniss says. In this she's right; last year, we were glued to each other in training - going from station to station together, trying not to show off too much of our combat strengths. Now, we're schmoozing potential allies. Still - I feel like the longer we spend apart, the longer she's going to stay mad at me.

I look around for Chaff - who I know she won't approach, but who Haymitch will definitely want us to ally with - and see him throwing spears with Brutus. Trying not to think too much about throwing spears last year with Katniss - or about hurling that trident into Cato - I join them at their station.

Meanwhile, Katniss goes over to the knot-tying station by herself. So much for covering more territory.

After spears, we go to knife throwing. Neither of these stations are my strong suit - as they involve aim over distance - but from practicing over the summer, I'm better than I used to be. Anyway, hardly anyone is paying attention. I talk to Chaff - try to get to know this guy Haymitch likes so much - and we make jokes about missing limbs that Katniss might not have liked, but feel kind of cathartic to me - and then he has a whole series of jokes about my bringing a lover right into the arena that Katniss definitely would not like. But again - they're a bit cathartic.

Cashmere, Enobaria and a tribute from 10 join us and we all just have a good time throwing knives. It's weird, but - even knowing that we're all going to be competing with each other to the death in a few days, there's a strange camaraderie. Only victors know what each other have been through.

After a while, Chaff elbows me and nods his head in the direction of the wrestling ring. Johanna is naked again and oiling herself up for wrestling - the Capitol attendant with whom she is about to spar is gaping at her, and she's not grinning, exactly, but her face is lit up with wicked humor.

I shake my head and turn back to the knives. This time, I take up the larger blades - the machete that I'm pretty comfortable with - and practice some moves and stances, but mostly I'm just listening in as more victors gather in a group - latecomers arrive and people just make small talk, of all things, reminding each other of stuff they did when they were all here together in the Capitol last year. I just jump in when I can, hoping to make enough people comfortable with me so they can approach me later, if they want. When Johanna joins us, smelling of sweat and sandalwood, everyone greets her with catcalls and laughter that she just turns back on them.

"Hey, Loverboy," she says to me. That of course was my nickname in last year's games.

"Hey, Johanna."

"When are we going to see _you_ wrestle?" she asks with a wink, and everyone laughs.

When we file into the cafeteria for lunch, there's a lot of laughing and eye rolling. Brutus and Gloss put a few tables together so everyone can sit together and keep on talking. I look around for Katniss and see her serving herself up some food. I hurry over to join her. "How's it going?"

She makes a face like she can't believe I'm bothering her and I get a massive dose of deja vu. "Good. Fine. I like the District Three victors. Wiress and Beetee."

"Really? They're something of a joke to the others." Of course, so is just about everything.

"Why does that not surprise me?" she replies, icily.

"Johanna's nicknamed them Nuts and Volts. I think - she's Nuts and he's Volts."

Her nostrils flare. "And so I'm stupid for thinking they might be useful. Because of something Johanna Mason said while she was oiling up her breasts for wrestling."

I bite my tongue on a laugh. "Actually, I think the nickname's been around for years. And I didn't mean that as an insult. I'm just sharing information."

"Well, Wiress and Beetee are smart. They invent things. They could tell by sight that a force field had been put up between us and the Gamemakers. And if we have to have allies, I want them." As if for emphasis, she tosses the ladle she's been clutching all this time back into a pot of stew, splattering both of us.

"What are you so angry about?" I ask her at last, wiping myself off. "Because I teased you on the elevator? I'm sorry. I thought you would just laugh about it."

"Forget it," she says stubbornly. "It's a lot of things."

Oh, she is so frustrating. At least last year she kept up an emotional distance from me because she was planning to kill me, and thought I was planning to kill her. Things should be different – they _are_ different. "Darius," I say, determined to get her to talk to me.

"Darius. The Games. Haymitch making us team up with the others."

"It can just be you and me, you know."

"I know. But maybe Haymitch is right. Don't tell him I said so, but he usually is, where the Games are concerned."

"Well, you can have final say about our allies. But right now, I'm leaning toward Chaff and Seeder."

"I'm OK with Seeder, not Chaff. Not yet, anyway." But I detect a defrosting in her tone.

"Come on and eat with him. I promise, I won't let him kiss you again." Katniss narrows her eyes as if suspecting that I'm making fun of her again, but she takes my offered hand.

Lunch goes well, and after that I hang out with Wiress and Beetee, trying to see what Katniss sees in them. I glance over and see Katniss talking to Finnick for the second time today - maybe she's not the only one who should be jealous ….

While Beetee is trying to explain to me how computer graphic design works - and my head starts spinning - we're all distracted by a sudden realization that the gym has gone quiet. It doesn't take long for me to realize that Katniss is at the heart of the atmospheric change in the room, and I run over to see what's going on. She's at the archery station, shooting down wave after wave of fake birds being launched in the air by the station attendant. She's so quick, and each motion is so fluid and natural - it's like watching Clove throw knives, but less brutal, somehow. Katniss is lost in the exercise - the art - of it all.

Back upstairs, the suite is actually deserted - I guess Haymitch and Effie are getting a head start with the sponsors - and Katniss and I just hang out in the living room, comparing notes. She steers clear of mentioning Johanna, and I only say that Finnick seems like he still has the skills he was known for in his games - trident-throwing and ropes.

She curls her lip. "And arrogance."

As dinner is served, Haymitch and Effie appear and, when we sit down, Haymitch turns to Katniss with a grin. "So, at least half the victors have instructed their mentors to request you as an ally. I know it can't be your sunny personality."

As Katniss thinks of an appropriate comeback, I step in. "They saw her shoot. Actually, I saw her shoot, for real, for the first time. I'm about to put in a formal request myself."

"You're that good? So good that Brutus wants you?"

She shrugs. "I don't want Brutus. I want Mags and District Three."

I keep my smile to myself and Haymitch sighs and orders a bottle of wine. "I'll tell everybody you're still making up your mind." He shoots me a look like I need to get her back in line or something, and I just shake my head.

The next day, Katniss and I spend the day paired up at different stations. We start at the camouflage station, which I was itching to get my hands on all day yesterday, but was occupied the whole time by the two District 6 tributes everyone calls the "morphlings." They're addicted to the painkiller. They also just like to spend all day finger painting, apparently, as they're back again, but this time we join them. What I find is that they are not talkative, but both very artistic, and we can speak in short-hand with colors. We spend the morning painting yellow flowers on the training room floor, with Katniss huffing impatiently - then we justify it all by camouflaging her within the flower field. I take a great deal of pleasure in having her close her eyes while I apply the yellows and greens and browns to her skin. Relinquishing control like this makes her jittery. But it makes a nice change for me.

In the afternoon, Finnick offers to exchange an hour of trident lessons with Katniss for archery lessons. Up close, I suddenly realize that Finnick was the mentor who got me in with the Careers last year. He looks different in person than he does on TV - less plastic, or something.

"You could probably use some time, too, Peeta," he tells me, spearing a dummy with his trident three times in rapid succession. "It wasn't bad for a first attempt, and under tracker jacker influence, but you could have saved yourself a world of trouble if you had offed Cato then and there."

I wince at the brashness of his words; these things I only think to myself in private.

Katniss doesn't let anyone criticize her friends, even mildly. "Then we would have had trouble of another kind, with Thresh. The important thing is he lived to tell about it."

I crook up my mouth.

"And you, right?" Finnick adds sarcastically. "It was all for the Girl on Fire, wasn't it?"

He looks from Katniss to me and back. Katniss and I just look at each other. I mean - it's out there, proclaimed on stage and screen: the saga of the star-crossed lovers. But we don't talk about it outside of cameras and audience. Katniss just says, "Ha, ha," and goes back to thrusting nervously at the training dummy. Hand-to-hand or close combat just isn't her thing.

Dinner that night is more relaxed than usual - even, a little fun. Since we are able to honestly say that we're engaging all the tributes, as ordered, and he's got a hot commodity in Katniss, Haymitch is in a much better mood than this time last year, when every grueling day of tense station-hopping and miserable lunch with Katniss concluded with sarcastic questioning from Haymitch over dinner. Katniss and I try to ruffle Effie's feathers, and that's one of Haymitch's few pleasures in life, so he's actually downright cheerful.

On the final day of training, we all don't do much of anything. Sub-groups have formed - ominously, Districts 1 and 2 are spending an increasing amount of time together - but there is basically free movement among everyone, as far as socializing goes. Since she's not a natural at it, Katniss sticks with me again today, but we spend the most time with her picks for allies, who are still, as they were from the beginning, Mags, Beetee and Wiress. I keep trying to put a word in for Chaff because I honestly think that he would be willing to protect Haymitch's tributes, but I don't press it too hard. She's incredibly protective of her private space - which makes our friendship a minor miracle - and she has no trust in people who don't understand that.

The afternoon of the final training day is given over to the private sessions with the Gamemakers. I've ignored the Gamemakers almost entirely - they spend the three training days hovering above us, on the balcony level of the gym - and it seems I'm not the only one. While we're all gathered in the cafeteria for lunch, waiting for the calls to begin, everyone starts talking about what they're going to do. It's all a bit of a joke - like this whole process is, really. The victors are adults, some of them elderly, forced to perform some routine for the Gamemakers in order to start the betting lines. Which have been going full force since the Quell was announced anyway.

Eventually, after several hours, Seeder is called away, leaving Katniss and I alone. Unlike last year, when we ended up sitting on opposite ends of the room, we're facing each other across a table. Katniss sighs and I take her hands.

"Decided what to do for the Gamemakers, yet?" I ask her.

"I can't really use them for target practice this year, with the force field up and all. Maybe make some fishhooks. What about you?"

"Not a clue. I keep wishing I could bake a cake or something."

"Do some more camouflage."

"If the morphlings have left me anything to work with. They've been glued to that station since training started." I think of the morphlings - going back in the arena after years of destroying their bodies and minds just to forget the first time. How they will be dead soon.

Katniss' thoughts track with mine. "How are we going to kill these people, Peeta?" she asks, with an ache in her voice.

I lean down and put my forehead on our entwined hands. "I don't know," is all I can think to say.

"I don't want them as allies. Why did Haymitch want us to get to know them? It'll make it so much harder than last time. Except for Rue, maybe. But I guess I never really could've killed her anyway. She was just too much like Prim."

I look up at her. This is the thing that I remember about that feverish, befuddled time spent in the ground, waiting on the slow pace of death. How my primary source of comfort in that time of pain and weakness was the knowledge that Katniss would make a very different kind of Victor. Forget the rebellion - Snow - Haymitch. Forget everything they expect - or dread - of her. Forget the symbols. Mockingjays, fire, arrows. _This is the thing that I remember_ : that it is kindness and fairness that motivates this girl. Friendship and allegiance - in itself a very selfless form of love - that informs her. It was these that saved my life. And I don't care what she thinks I ever did for her - it's nothing at all to what she means to me.

All I say to her is, "Her death was the most despicable, wasn't it?"

"None of them were very pretty."

On that, they call my name and I give her an encouraging squeeze and exit.

In contrast to last year, the Gamemakers are standing in place, looking down at the training center floor with rapt attention. I suppose it is that we are all so much more interesting now - celebrities, not random kids. I look up at Plutarch Heavensbee and I think about how these people - these sick people - are actually judging me. How twisted and backward; how without logic or emotional sense. All I ever did was _nothing,_ except try to save a girl, who turned around and returned the favor.

There's a cough and I realize I haven't introduced myself, yet - as if they don't know who I am. "Peeta Mellark, District 12," I mutter resentfully.

I still don't know what I'm going to do, so I head over to the camouflage station, since it's the last thing Katniss mentioned. The problem is - they've seen this from me, and in the arena, too.

I see a nice blue ink - dark in shade but bright in intensity. Maybe I'll just paint my face. I mean, it couldn't possibly matter less. I don't give a shit about my training score. But by the time I collect all the paints I want and go back to the middle of the floor, a completely different idea has taken me. They are all jumbled in together - Rue, Katniss. The boy with the spear. The district with the bread. Everyone pays, I think to myself. Everyone should be made to pay.

I've never painted so rapidly in my life, and at such an angle. Half bent over, half kneeling, I paint that little girl on the concrete surface of the gym floor. Rue. Dead. Not dead as _I_ saw her, tangled in netting with a spear through her middle. Dead as _they_ saw her - the Gamemakers - and made sure the rest of us couldn't see. But I know it - I've heard the uncensored account. I paint her as Katniss honored her, enshrouded in wildflowers. And maybe she even looked younger than she did the day she was reaped. A small child, worked like a dog until she was taken away and killed. By them - the monsters in the balcony.

"Time's up, Mr. Mellark," I hear, but I wave it off. I'm not finished yet, and my sorrow-tipped rage is still carrying me along. Fine, I think - take me out by force, drag me, beat me, target me in the arena. Take your one victor.

Then I finish, and I am on my knees, back to the Gamemakers, trying to look at the picture, objectively, before I leave. They'll destroy it first thing, a thought that brings sudden tears to my eyes. This is an ephemeral statement. Even in my memory it won't last very long, because I'll soon be dead.

"Mr. Mel-."

"I know. I'm going."

And I get up and leave.


	18. Chapter 18

**Chapter Eighteen**

* * *

I can't quite get all the paint out; after a shower so long that the hot water starts running out, multicolored spots are still flecked all over my hands, and gathered under my nails. Not that I was going to lie about it anyway, when Haymitch inevitably asks, though I'm increasingly nervous about facing the question. I am the first in the dining room, but Katniss follows shortly afterward. She smiles. "How'd it go?" she starts. "You-." But then Haymitch comes in, humming tunelessly, and her voice dies away so she can listen to him with amazement.

Portia, Cinna and Effie all arrive and the soup is served. I'm still frowning at it when Haymitch asks how the private sessions went.

Katniss and I look at each other. She shrugs. "You first," she says. "It must have been really special. I had to wait forty minutes to go in."

I open my mouth, but no words come to me. I look at Haymitch, then switch hastily back to Katniss. "Well, I - I did the camouflage thing, like you suggested, Katniss. Not exactly camouflage; I mean, I used the dyes."

"To do what?" asks Portia cautiously.

Katniss looks at me quizzically. "You painted something, didn't you? A picture."

"Did you see it?" I ask, astonished.

"No. But they'd made a real point of covering it up."

"Well, that would be standard," says Effie. "They can't let one tribute know what another did. What did you paint, Peeta? Was it a picture of Katniss?"

Katniss snorts. "Why would he paint a picture of me?"

"To show he's going to do everything he can to defend you. That's what everyone in the Capitol's expecting anyway. Didn't he volunteer to go in with you?"

Katniss rolls her eyes and I smile at her and address only her, when I say, "Actually I painted a picture of Rue. How she looked - how she must have looked - after Katniss had covered her in flowers."

Katniss' lips part in surprise. Around the rest of the table, the hush is palpable.

"And what exactly were you trying to accomplish?" asks Haymitch, between his teeth. All his good mood of the last couple of days has evaporated.

What was I trying to _accomplish_? "I'm not sure," I reply softly. "I just wanted to hold them accountable, if only for a moment. For killing that little girl."

The astonished ferocity on Katniss' face is counterbalanced by the look of disappointed horror on Effie's. "This is dreadful," she says. "That sort of thinking … it's forbidden, Peeta. Absolutely. You'll only bring more trouble on yourself and Katniss."

"I have to agree with Effie on this one," says Haymitch.

I turn to face him, Effie and the stylists. More trouble? Aren't we the top of the Gamemakers' kill list already? I just shrug.

Katniss speaks out abruptly. "I guess this is a bad time to mention I hung a dummy and painted Seneca Crane's name on it."

Now it's my turn to gape. And she looks at me again, her eyes still blazing. It's funny, but there comes a time when all the grown-ups in your life trying to protect you - are just wrong. Because you can't always run and hide behind them. I don't know what awaits these four - Haymitch, Portia, Effie and Cinna - but I know where Katniss and I are going, and, the way I see it, it's our very last chance to take any kind of stand.

"You - hung - Seneca - Crane?" says Cinna.

"Yes, I was showing off my new knot-tying skills and he somehow ended up at the end of the noose.

"Oh, Katniss, how do you even know about that?" asks Effie in a low voice.

"Is it a secret? President Snow didn't act like it was. In fact, he seemed eager for me to know."

Effie leaves the table abruptly, covering her face. "Now I've upset Effie. I should have lied and said I shot some arrows." She looks at me with the ghost of an amused smile.

"You'd have thought we planned it," I say, returning it.

"Didn't you?" asks Portia, wanly.

Katniss looks at me and, I think for the first time, ever, opens up the depths of her eyes to me. "No," she says. "Neither of us even knew what we were going to do before we went in."

"And Haymitch?" I add, looking at her for confirmation. She nods. "We decided we don't want any other allies in the arena."

"Good," he shoots back. "Then I won't be responsible for you killing off any of my friends with your stupidity."

"That's just what we were thinking," Katniss tells him.

For the first time, she and I are allied against these four dedicated people who have done nothing but try to help us stay alive, to protect us from the very wave of trouble we began with our actions in the arena. But I can't even pretend to regret it.

Effie rejoins us after dinner to watch the training recap. She's clearly been crying. Haymitch maintains a dark and surly expression. But Portia and Cinna are, as always, more reasonable. Cinna gives Katniss an encouraging squeeze as we walk toward the sitting room, and Portia throws me a small smile. I hope some part of her can be proud of me for using my last painting as a statement against the Capitol.

The Careers, minus Mags, all receive high scores - 8-10s, the standard Career range. Everyone else falls between 3 and 7.

"Have they ever given a zero?" asks Katniss, as we all wait in a kind of resigned anticipation for my score.

"No, but there's a first time for everything," replies Cinna.

And in fact, I'm given a 12 - the highest score possibly and the first one I've ever actually seen. Katniss gasps loudly and I turn red. Then Katniss, also, receives a 12.

"Why did they do that?" she asks.

"So that the others will have no choice but to target you," says Haymitch, staring at the screen and not at us. "Go to bed. I can't stand to look at either one of you."

We don't protest. I get up and hold out a hand to Katniss, and she takes it without hesitation. We walk down the hall to the bedrooms; hers is the first one, and I stop, let go of her hand, and turn to say goodnight, but she abruptly throws her arms around me and rests her head on my chest. After a second's hesitation, I let myself return the embrace, and I bow my head so that it is entangled in her fragrant hair.

She looks up. "I'm sorry if I made things worse," she says.

"No worse than I did. Why did you do it, anyway?"

"I don't know. To show them that I'm more than just a piece in their Games?"

I laugh at that, remembering our argument from last year - how unreasonably angry we both were at each other over my declaration of independence from the games. The past year has shown me both how right and wrong I've been about that. They don't own me in the real sense - my thoughts and desires, my knowledge of right and wrong: these belong to me. But my life and death are certainly theirs. But that Katniss knows this now, too - knows it and acknowledges it? This is a huge thing. It means that, at the very least, I've passed some part of me - one of the better ones - to her. She can carry me forward with her, wherever she goes. "Me, too," I tell her. "And I'm not saying that I'm not going to try. To get you home, I mean. But - if I'm perfectly honest about it …." I bite my lip on the thing I can't bring myself to say.

"If you're perfectly honest about it, you think President Snow has probably given them direct orders to make sure we die in the arena, anyway."

"It's crossed my mind. But - even if that happens, everyone will know we've gone out fighting, right?"

"Everyone will know," she answers, softly. She continues to look up at me, and me down at her, for a couple of quiet minutes. I'm trying to picture that imaginary world of uprisings. That fantasy world of a future without Snow, without the Capitol, without the Games. All I can picture is the wreckage of District 13, and how easily the Capitol can destroy things. Perhaps they don't want to - it would be hard to justify destroying the suppliers of all your worldly goods. But I'm not sure logic is in control of Panem, right now. There's an unreasoning spitefulness to the Quell - like Snow's a toddler taking away the Victors' toys just because he's been put out by some criticism. Logically, at this point, why not convene some committee to overturn the Games? Especially if it were to become as repugnant to its Capitol audience as it is to the districts …

Katniss sighs over my thoughts. "So, what should we do with our last few days?"

"I just want to spend every possible minute of the rest of my life with you," I say - honestly expecting to see the guilt and discomfort return to her face, but so beyond caring about censoring myself, anymore. In the arena or out of it.

But she only gives me a thoughtful look. "Come on, then," she says, pulling me into her room.

As she closes the door behind us, I do wonder if this is a good idea. The changes between us are quiet, almost imperceptible - but they are there. Even since the last time we shared a bed together. I've moved past my gauzy phase, in terms of my feelings for her, and even past the self-pitying phase. There's a realism to it, now - an acknowledgement of her flaws and inconsistencies, a shield between me and her lack of ability to open up and love me. And with that realism comes harder-edged stuff; my commitment to her deepened despite everything - maybe even because of everything - my desire for her stronger, more focused, less protective.

But she trusts me, and that is more important than anything.

* * *

In the morning, I wake up first, jolted awake not by nightmares, but by the sun, which is rising at the wrong angle. Then I remember that I'm in Katniss' room. We're sleeping in our underwear - she is curled up against me, head on my arm. I've got a mouthful of her hair. Same as always.

I separate myself from her a little, so she won't bump up against the one part of my body that woke before I did. The movement causes her to stir and she blinks peacefully at the sun.

"No nightmares," I say.

"No nightmares. You?"

"None. I'd forgotten what a real night's sleep feels like."

"I'm not looking forward to today," she says. "What on earth am I going to do for four hours with Haymitch? It doesn't even matter to me how the interview goes."

"Well, we're not working separately this year, so we can meet with him together and I won't let him bully you."

"After last night - I can't even imagine what kind of mood he's in."

The red-headed Avox girl comes in after giving a short knock on the door. She doesn't seem surprised to see me in there, and she just hands Katniss a note addressed to the both of us.

"Given your recent tour, Haymitch and I agree that you can handle yourselves adequately in public. Today's sessions have been cancelled. Effie."

"Really?" I say, something like happiness flooding my chest. I take the note and read it, but it's no joke. "Do you know what this means? We'll have the whole day to ourselves."

"It's too bad we can't go somewhere."

"Who says we can't?" I grin. "Get dressed, then think of all the things you might possibly want to eat."

Within an hour, we're on the roof, with blankets and food. On the rooftop of the training center there is a garden of sorts - potted plants and trees with wind chimes hanging from their branches. The chimes are an interesting added feature. When you're within the garden, and there's a good wind, it feels like the chimes might be loud enough to block your voice from whatever potential listening devices are up here. It's strange that the Capitol doesn't know about them; or, if it does, that it allows them to remain. Maybe it's to lure the tributes who come up to the roof into a false sense of security. But I like to imagine that the mentors have, over the years, added the chimes to build a secure place where they can speak freely.

After we eat, we look out over the city, going to all four sides of the roof, trying to get our bearings and figure out exactly which direction 12 is. Then I do a new sketch of Katniss in my notebook. Katniss pulls vines off the trees and practices her knots. I start throwing an apple against the force field that surrounds the training center roof, then Katniss joins me and we take turns catching the apple as it is bounced back to us. A couple of kids enjoying the illusion of a normal childhood

Whenever we feel hungry, we eat. Whenever we feel like talking - whatever we feel like talking about - we talk. This is what it is like to be finally free - free of hunger and poverty, free of strategies and expectations, free of the burden of life under the Capitol's sway. I approach my upcoming death with calm acceptance. And for that I am awarded these hours of pure bliss.

She picks some bright yellow flowers and lays her head down on my lap as she knots them together. I gently loose the band in her hair and unravel her braid, letting her long strands of hair slide through my fingers. Then, I work through all of my sexual frustration by remaking her hair into braids, over and over again. I tell her I'm practicing knots of my own. But after a while, I stop and look down at her. A couple of teenagers enjoying the illusion of a normal adolescence.

"What?" she asks me.

"I wish I could freeze this moment, right here, right now, and live in it forever."

"OK," she says.

I smile. "Then - you'll allow it?"

"I'll allow it."

She finishes her rope of flowers and ties it together to make a crown, which she gives me and orders me to put on.

"Don't you need half of it?" I tease her.

"Not this time," she says, sleepily.

I think about this as she drifts off to sleep and I continue weaving her hair. I need to think of some way of getting her back to thinking of herself as a winner. Indirectly, this wonderful day might be sabotaging my plans. I probably should have maintained a firm but friendly distance. But - I should have known better. She is my weakness, the one thing I've never been able to give up or get over. The one person I could never refuse.

When the sun starts to set, I rouse her, knowing that she'll probably want to see it.

"Thanks," she says, stretching and rising. We go over to the western side of the roof and lean against the railing to watch the sky burn gold and orange and pink behind the tall buildings and the mountain ranges.

"Do you think we should go down for dinner?"

"Has anyone summoned us?"

"No - I haven't seen or heard anyone. They must realize we're up here."

"Maybe they're just letting us have this whole day," she says.

"I'm glad. I'm tired of making everyone around me so miserable. Everybody crying. Or Haymitch…"

As night falls, we note the appearance of the few stars that are strong enough to struggle through the Capitol's brightly-lit sky. In the quiet that hushes between us, I think of a million words to say to her. Now that I have the confidence and opportunity, circumstances have robbed me of the motive. In as gentle a way as I can manage it, once we're in the arena, I'm going to have to push her away from me, toward life. That's going to be hard enough to manage without leaving her the scorching words on the tip of my tongue. Anyway, she knows already. But I find myself wishing - half-dreading, also - to know, what has changed with her, how does she feel about me? Because it's becoming clear that the terrain has shifted again and how she feels now is clearly not the same as it was on the train on the way home last year. It's not the same as it was on the Victory Tour; not even the same as it was the day that Gale was whipped. It would be better, I think, to die knowing exactly what I am to her. Yet - to speak of it, to give it substance - would disrupt the current plan. We are _friends_. We are _allies_. She must live, so I must die. This is unchangeable, so I must be unyielding.

That night, we go straight back down to her room, and still see no one. The sitting room even looks dark. Maybe Haymitch took the opportunity of a free day to visit with his friends, scare up some booze. I politely turn away while she strips down again to her underwear. And I strip down to mine. Then I hesitate.

"I'm going to remove my le - my prosthetic leg tonight."

"OK."

"I just wanted to warn you - I don't think you've seen me without it? But it's more comfortable to sleep without it."

She nods from her position on the bed and watches me while I do it. I'm expecting to feel a little embarrassed, but I actually don't mind.

She reaches over and touches my bare knee, just above the stump. I'm sure she just means it as a gesture that she's not put off by the incomplete leg, but the tingle that goes up my body from the contact-point of her fingers gets lost in the region between my legs. I take her hand abruptly and remove it. I stare at her knuckles. A man and a woman caught within the illusion of normal adulthood.

"Katniss, you know you can trust me, right?"

"Yes," she breathes.

"But, I'm only human, so - maybe, that's a ... line."

She blushes and abruptly takes back her hand. "Sorry."

"There's nothing to be sorry about. It's nobody's fault. It's just the - way that it is." I give her a smile and hold her eyes until she smiles back. I don't want to be kicked out of her room, even if it's for my own good.

Our forced separation by her preps in the morning is something of a relief. I head to my own room to shower and relieve some of the accumulated tension. Then I have to face my own prep team. Since they waxed me before, there's not much to do except for file down my nails, apply some light makeup to my face and curl my hair.

At lunch, Katniss and I meet up again and sit next to each other at the table, while Haymitch watches us unhappily from the other side and Cinna and Portia both eat quietly. Katniss' hair has been set in several braids that are pinned up to the back of her head in an elaborate knot. I stare at it, wondering how her preps did it. Her makeup isn't severe, but it is distinctive, making her look older.

After lunch we're separated again and I go back to my room with Portia, this time.

"Effie gave me this for you," she says, holding out a box.

Inside is a gold locket, imprinted with the Mockingjay symbol that has become so fashionable here since last year's games. Katniss has told me how it has also become a symbol for the rebels in the districts. So, this is a double-edged token. Perfect. I pop it open and look at the two pictures that Effie has inserted in it. Both pictures of Katniss are a little too heavily-made-up for my liking. I hand it back to Portia, who crinkles her eyes.

"Can you do me a favor? Would you be able to get two different pictures for me?"

She takes the locket with a puzzled expression. "Maybe. What pictures?"

"I don't know if you can pull them off of any tapes from last year, but I'd like pictures of her mom and sister." I pause. Hesitate. And then make up my mind. "Also, of her cousin - Gale."

"I'll try," she says. I wish - I wish I could talk to her more freely. Last year, there was not this constraint between us, because the things I had to hide were only from Katniss.

She pulls a suit out of a garment bag and I look at it in consternation, as I realize it's not just a suit, but a tuxedo, complete with a stiff white shirt, a multi-colored vest - all pale blues and greens and shiny, like the inside of an abalone shell - pearl cufflinks and, worst of all, white gloves. I feel rather ridiculous wearing it. I look slightly ridiculous in it. I would never criticize Portia's choices - there's always a point to them - but I don't get this.

At least, not until I see Katniss, when we all meet up at the elevator. She's dressed in one of the wedding gowns that I saw on TV the night of the Quarter Quell announcement. It's the one I liked the most, with the dramatic sleeves flowing right to the floor, the heavy silk skirt opening over fluffy organza ruffles. Ropes of pearls are around her throat, in the veil on her head, even at the hems of the dress. Of course - that explains my outfit. I always match Katniss and in this case, we are going into the interview as the Capitol bride and groom we will never be.

I stare at her in shock and she looks at me unhappily. Oh, she's beautiful, yes. But this is a horrible reminder that our relationship is a Capitol fiction. An illusion.

The interview stage is set up in front of the President's mansion, which is at the top of the city circle a few hundred feet away from the training center. There's a curtain set up between the two buildings so we are separated from the gathering crowd as we walk to the stage. Once we arrive, and Haymitch leaves us to our own devices, the other tributes turn to stare at us.

Finnick says, "I can't believe Cinna put you in that thing."

"He didn't have any choice," snaps Katniss. "President Snow made him."

Oh. So, that's what's going on.

Cashmere, going for sex appeal with a gold mini-skirt and crop top, tosses her hair. "Well, you look ridiculous!" she says, and grabs her brother's hand to take their places at the head of the procession.

But most of the other tributes are sympathetic, and give her encouraging pats on the back before lining up in order - Johanna actually comes over and tells Katniss, "Make him pay for it, OK?"

The twenty-four of us walk to the stage and find our seats, which are lined up at the back of the stage behind the chairs that are set up for Caesar and the interviewee. I'm still thinking about how exactly I'm going to frame my argument for Katniss when the interviews start - the most incredible interviews Panem has ever seen or Caesar Flickerman ever lived through.

First, it's Cashmere, weeping very real-looking tears as she sympathizes with the Capitol crowd and how much they are going to miss her and her brother - who are apparently regulars at every party. Then Gloss - praising the audience for the kindness he and his sister have always received from them. The District 2 careers - in typical fashion - provide the usual chest-beating commitment to winning the games. Hopeless. But - there's Beetee, challenging the legality of the Quell in relationship to the terms of the Hunger Games. There's Finnick, causing a mass outbreak of the vapors by reciting a poem dedicated to his one true love in the Capitol. Even Johanna, whose somewhat abrasive voice softens as she asks straight-up if anything can be done to cancel the Quell, pointing out that its creators probably didn't realize how much affection would grow up between the victors and the Capitol. Seeder and Chaff tag-team, with their remarks, a speech in which they question whether or not Snow has the power to stop the Games.

The net result is an audience in near-riot mood. They are loud - they are talking back to the victors - some angrily denouncing them, but most shouting out their agreement. When Katniss steps out of the backstage darkness and into the spotlight - so that the crowd can see exactly how she is dressed - there's a strange sound from the audience, a collective sort of animal groan, laced with individual cries for the games to be cancelled. It is the craziest thing that has ever happened on the television sets of Panem. I think - how this must be backfiring for Snow, how the district rebels must be taking heart by the reactions of the crowd who have never said such things out loud.

Most of Katniss' stage time is taken up by the screaming crowd, who won't obey Caesar's attempts to silence them. Finally, though, there's a lull. And Caesar says, in a strained voice, "So, Katniss - this is obviously a very emotional night for everyone. Is there anything you'd like to say?"

"Only that I'm so sorry you won't get to be at my wedding," she says in a soft, trembling voice.

Good job, girl, I think to myself in a voice that sounds like Haymitch's. She, too, is playing up what the crowd is being denied by the mere existence of the Quarter Quell. "But I'm glad you at least get to see me in my dress. Isn't it just … the most beautiful thing?"

Without waiting for a response, she begins to twirl, as she did last year. Then something truly insane starts happening. At first I think it is the illusory flame of last year's jewel-encrusted dress. But amid the flicker of faint flames, a real smoke begins to rise up. The pearls from the gown clatter to the stage, and then the white layers of her gown start burning away - revealing another gown beneath it. Katniss keeps twirling and I grip the edge of my seat, trying to swallow my alarm and remember that Cinna can be trusted.

Then it's over - the flames are gone. And Katniss is left standing in a dress the exact twin of her wedding gown - except that it's coal black and the silk has been replaced by tiny down feathers. She lifts her long sleeves up and stares at her arms in wonder, and that's when it becomes obvious. In profile, she is a bird, now. A mockingjay.


	19. Chapter 19

**Chapter Nineteen**

* * *

 _Cinna._ From the chairs at the back of the stage, I can't see the audience members clearly, especially in the front rows, where the stylists sit. But I recognize at once the dramatic statement he has made here tonight - and not in the privacy of the training center - not something that can be mopped up, covered with a mat. For the audience, gasping with admiration, it is his masterpiece. The girl on fire, transformed from a young bride to the very symbol that identifies her. But for Snow - for the watching rebels - as open a statement of defiance as has ever been made on this stage.

By the time I'm conscious of the conversation on the stage again, Caesar is, in fact, pointing Cinna out to the crowd, and he stands as the cameras zoom on him, acknowledging their appreciation with a smile. I catch a glimpse of Portia next to him, smiling, also, and applauding. I'm sick with worry for her. Realize that she must know the significance of what he has done. That there has been no need to shield Portia from the truth about the rebellions. She probably knows more than I do.

Katniss' time is up now, so she is dismissed to thunderous applause and returns to the seat next to mine. Her dress is still smoking a little - and it reminds me of something.

I rise for my interview and walk slowly and deliberately to the center of the stage, where Caesar - his wig, eyebrows and lips dyed lavender this year - greets me with an expression mounting to desperation. He's sweating behind his makeup. But he and I have an excellent rapport.

"How's that for a preview of domestic bliss," says Caesar. "It's like overcooking the poultry in here."

It's not his best work, but he's desperate to undercut the impact of the dress. So, I play along.

"Yes, well, it's a good thing I'm a better cook," I say. And there's laughter.

"You must be used to fire in the kitchen, of course," he says. "Surely, sometimes even you must burn the bread."

I look at him, rendered temporarily speechless. My mind whirls and suddenly - everything clicks into place. _Burnt fingers._

"Uh - sure," I say, distractedly.

"So, Peeta, what was it like when, after all you've been through, you found out about the Quell?"

It's an excellent transition. "I was in shock. I mean, one minute I'm seeing Katniss looking so beautiful in all these wedding gowns, and the next …."

"You realized there was never going to be a wedding," he finishes, perfectly on cue.

I purse my lips - stare out over the hushed audience - look down at the floor - then back up to Caesar. "Do you think all our friends here can keep a secret?" I ask.

There's scattered laughter from the crowd at my absurd question.

"I feel quite certain of it," says Caesar.

"We're already married," I say, quietly.

As the crowd reacts, the cameras flicker over to Katniss, who has buried her head in her lap. I smile, wondering if they've replaced that urn she shoved me into last year.

"But - how can that be?"

"Oh, it's not an official marriage. We didn't go to the Justice Building or anything. But we have this marriage ritual in District 12. I don't know what it's like in the other districts. But there's this thing we do - it's the most important part of the ritual. After you register with the Justice Building, and are assigned a house, you might have some cake and songs with family and friends, but the important part is the toasting. That's where you make a fire in your new home and toast bread together in it. And say some words. That's what we did."

"Were your families there?"

"No, we didn't tell anyone. Not even Haymitch. And Katniss' mother would never have approved. But you see, we knew if we were married in the Capitol, there wouldn't be a toasting. And neither of us really wanted to wait any longer, anyway. So, one day, we just did it." I pause, almost as wrapped up as everyone else by the romantic little fantasy I'm weaving. "And to us, we're more married than any piece of paper or big party could make us."

"So, this was before the Quell?"

I frown. "Of course, before the Quell. I'm sure we'd never have done it after we knew. But who could've seen it coming? No one. We went through the Games, we were victors, everyone seemed so thrilled to see us together, and then out of nowhere - I mean how could we anticipate a thing like that?"

"You couldn't, Peeta. As you say, no one could have. But I have to confess, I'm glad you two had at least a few months of happiness together."

He winks at me, and the crowd goes wild again. They all know what he's implying. Maybe a bittersweet ending, at least. Again the cameras close in on Katniss, and she's now looking up with a wistful smile and shining eyes – playing her part. But I'm not done, and Caesar has played into my hands again. "I'm not glad," I say. "I wish we had waited until the whole thing was done officially."

"Surely even a brief time is better than no time at all?"

I lick my lips. "Maybe I'd think that, too, Caesar. If it weren't for the baby."

The hush in the crowd builds up slowly to a horrified rasp - like the wind on the edge of the storm. It howls. It chatters like angry crows. Then it breaks like a thunderclap - igniting the atmosphere of the square. A pregnant woman in the arena? To their knowledge, it's never before happened. A family going in together - father, mother and child, all reaped together? It's only in this concrete example - not the theoretical concept of the unborn progeny of previous tributes - that they can finally see a connection between the barbarism of the games and the humanity of its victims. It's not much, but it's all they can give me. And it's enough, I think - not to stop the Games, which Snow will not steer off course. But to make Katniss' death unacceptable.

 _A broken heart._

The cameras cut again to catch her reaction, but her face is unreadable. By the time it has returned to mine, tears have leaked out of my eyes. I wipe them and wave to acknowledge the sympathetic anger roaring up from the crowd. They bury the end of my time with Caesar, who waves me up wearily as my time expires. I jump up and return to the seat next to Katniss. To my own surprise, the tears are still rolling down my face. The anthem starts up and, as we rise, I take her hand. We glance at each other, then Katniss spontaneously reaches over to Chaff, on her other side, and grasps the stump at the end of his left arm. The cameras are still sweeping over us and I can see Chaff take Seeder's hand, then on to District 10, 9, 8 … until the entire row of tributes - even District 2 - is linked together. There seems to be a sudden realization by the directors that this - on top of the basically defiant interviews - is not good PR for the Games, and the large screens around the square suddenly switch off.

The crowd noise - which has gone on and on, even through the anthem - suddenly fizzles in surprise. The victors on the stage break the chain and start milling around. The stage lights go out and there's no direction from anyone. Caesar has collapsed into his chair and the technical crew around us are getting frantic instructions in their ears. I grab Katniss' hand and lead her backstage before something really crazy happens. For a second, I contemplate making a complete break for it, in the confusion, and running through the streets of the Capitol, trying to find the border of it - like Haymitch did in his arena - to just step out of it and disappear. But Peacekeepers start filling up the backstage area and these thoughts vanish.

We go back into the training center and head for the elevators. There's one standing open, already, so we hurry into it. As the doors start to close, I see both Finnick and Johanna trying to catch up with us and share it, but a Peacekeeper blocks them, the doors close, and we shoot up alone. She looks down through the glass walls of the elevator at the chaos below, and gives me no sign - none. When we step off the elevator, I grip her shoulders and force her to look at me.

"There isn't much time, so tell me. Is there anything I have to apologize for?"

To my surprise, and relief, she smiles at me. "Nothing."

We go to the sitting room and wait quietly like the good little tributes that we aren't. Dinner is served, but we still wait for the others. Finally, the suite door opens, and it's Haymitch.

"It's madness out there," he says. "Everyone's been sent home and they've canceled the recap of the interviews on television."

Katniss and I rush over to the windows in the dining room and peer down. There's always a party in the streets after interview night, but this one does look a little less festive. "What are they saying?" I ask Haymitch. "Are they asking the President to stop the games?"

"I don't think they know themselves what to ask. The whole situation is unprecedented. Even the idea of opposing the Capitol's agenda is a source of confusion for the people here. But there's no way Snow would cancel the Games. You know that, right?"

Of course. We know.

"The others went home?" asks Katniss.

"They were ordered to. I don't know how much luck they're having getting through the mob."

"Then we'll never see Effie again," I realize. "You'll give her our thanks."

"More than that," says Katniss warmly. "Really make it special. It's Effie, after all. Tell her how appreciative we are and how she was the best escort ever and tell her … tell her we send our love."

The room grows very quiet as the three of us stand there, locked, trapped, in our assigned roles. Haymitch - about to go take residence in the Game Center. Us, about to go to the arena for slaughter. A strange family, the three of us, where the lines don't quite match up and our familial roles blur. Haymitch, both mentor and damaged child. Katniss, fiercely independent and devoted to her dependents. Me - lovesick and … what? Protective of this girl who is well capable of protecting herself.

Haymitch coughs. "I guess this where we say our good-byes as well."

"Any last words of advice?" I ask him.

"Stay alive," he says gruffly, and I almost laugh. He hugs us each in turn and, up close, you can actually see the pain in his face. Some part of him must wish we had died quietly in the last Games like all his other tributes, and spared him all this effort and heartache. "Go to bed. You need your rest."

"You take care, Haymitch," I tell him.

Katniss just looks at him, unable to speak.

We start to head to the hall, obeying his last command, when his voice stops us. "Katniss!" he barks, and we turn around. "When you're in the arena …."

Katniss scowls at him. "What?" she asks defensively.

"You just remember who the enemy is. That's all. Now go on. Get out of here."

She shakes her head in exasperation as we continue toward the hall. At her bedroom door, she won't let go of my hand.

I laugh, gently. "I have to change and shower off all the makeup."

"If you go into your room - and me into mine - I'm worried they might lock our doors."

Although they did do that once, last year, after our victory recap, that was because we were being carefully monitored as a result of the furor we had just caused. I shake my head, but she clutches me even tighter.

"There's a shower in my room," she says.

I follow her into her room. "Do you want to go first?" I ask her.

"No, go ahead."

I go into her bathroom and strip off the tuxedo. Then I set the warm water of the shower to its most powerful jet setting and strip the layers of makeup and lotion, and as much of the toner and paint as possible, off of my body. The lash of the water doesn't help to calm me down. As soon as I tell myself not to think about it, I am immediately reminded that this is the last night of my life I will not be on television. The last possible night of my life to spend with a girl. So, I just stand there in the water, imagining all the things I am not going to do, and turn the temperature of the shower way down.

I put on the underwear I wore tonight, but it smells like lotion and sweat, so, when she's taking her own shower, I prop open her door with a chair, then sneak down the hallway to put on clean shorts and a t-shirt. Better.

When I go back to her room, I order up food from the kitchen. Hot cocoa, turkey sandwiches, and chocolate cake. She comes out of the bathroom in sweatpants and a t-shirt, and she carefully hangs up her mockingjay dress in the closet. Then we sit at the edge of the bed and eat together.

I say: "I'm sorry I didn't warn you about the whole baby thing. It didn't fully come to me until we were on stage."

She shakes her head. "That's OK. I wouldn't have wanted to second-guess it or something. I think it was really smart and - even if it doesn't help us specifically, maybe it will have long-term consequences."

"Maybe." I think about this for a minute. "What do you think happens when Snow's gone?" I say. "I mean - just naturally, when he dies. How do they even elect a new president? All I remember from school is something about 'by popular accord.' But that could mean anything."

"Why?"

I shrug. "Maybe the next president will be more motivated to end the games, or something. If 'popular accord' runs against it."

"Hmm," she says. "Maybe."

"Before we go to bed - can I get you anything?"

She stretches and I blink away from the sight of her breasts straining against her shirt. "No. Yes? Tell me a story."

"A - what? A story?"

"Yes," she says with a grin. "Tell me about the happiest day of your life - but not one with me in it," she adds.

"That's quite a restriction, Everdeen," I say, frowning.

So, I tell her some plain old story about my tenth birthday, which happened to fall on a Saturday, so there was no school. Nothing special, just that my mother was in a good mood for once. Her brother was too sick to come, but his kids were there - well, Ally and Isoc - and we were all just so young then. We played in the vacant schoolyard and picnicked on chicken, greens and bread, of course. Also, a rare cake. I showed my grandmother my sketchbook - she was always doodling, herself - and that's when she decided that I was going to learn to do the icing at the bakery, and take over from her.

"Your grandmother is where you get the art - stuff - from."

I laugh. "Yeah, that's where it comes from, I guess."

"So, that's the secret to becoming Peeta Mellark?" she asks with a grin.

"Partly," I tell her. "As Haymitch has told me, I obviously also get an unrepentant romantic streak from my dad."

Finally, we turn off the lights and take our usual positions on the bed, she curled up with her back to me, her head resting on my arm. But it's a restless night for sleep. Our proximity to each other can't hold off the nightmares that come, unrelentingly, waking me up three or four times that night. I can sense her stirring awake, too, off and on.

By dawn, all pretense at sleep is done and we lie there, huddled together, waiting with dread for the arrival of our stylists to separate us for our trip to the arena. It's possible - entirely possible - that once separated, we will never see each other alive again. Who knows what will happen at the cornucopia today?

Cinna and Portia arrive together and I put on the prosthesis, then bend down to muffle my face in Katniss' hair, to mouth an unheard "I love you." Then I give her a gentle kiss.

"See you soon," I tell her.

"See you soon."

I follow Portia to my room and get dressed. On top of the dresser is my notebook, which includes the two sketches I have done here.

"Will you take this?" I ask her.

Of course she does, and with a sad smile.

The hovercraft picks us up from the roof and while I stand frozen on the ladder that lifts me up, I look down and watch the rooftop - site of the one day I was truly, blissfully happy - recede. Portia and I eat breakfast in the hovercraft, then I stare out the windows and watch the terrain fly over. We seem to be heading south-east, and for a while we have a spectacular aerial view of the mountain range in which the Capitol is set. After we leave the mountains, the terrain flattens out dramatically and gray-brown earth stretches out for as far as I can see. Eventually - after what seems twice as long as last year - the windows darken so I can't see my final destination, and we arrive at the arena.

I shower in the launch room and Portia helps me dress in the designated arena clothes. This year, it's a light blue jumpsuit, made out of some tight mesh, over boxer shorts and a t-shirt.

"It doesn't look like much protection from the cold," I say, as Portia helps me complete the ensemble with a plastic belt and rubbery shoes.

"No," she says. "Desert maybe, or tropics."

Those environments are foreign to me, so I'm not sure if that's good or bad news. Eliminating freezing to death as an option in the arena seems like good news, but it is sure to have been replaced by something even worse.

"Here you go," adds Portia, pulling out the locket. She opens it to confirm the pictures I requested, and I close it firmly, put it around my neck and stick it under the jumpsuit. "Also, Haymitch wanted to pass a message on."

I lift my eyebrows. Something for my ears and not Katniss'? Or something he simply forgot to say last night? "OK?"

"He says, don't go rushing into heroics. The longer you stay alive, the longer she will."

"That's basically telling me to get all the way to the end with her again," I say, rolling my eyes.

"Well …."

"Well, yes, if I can, of course, I will. 'Stay alive.' That's all he ever tells me."

"There aren't a whole lot of options in the arena," she says. "Especially not knowing what form it will take."

"Hmm."

"Peeta," she says, seriously.

"Sorry, I don't mean to be grumpy. Not with you. This whole thing is just so frustrating."

"To put it mildly."

"To put it mildly," I repeat. I look at her and wonder what I can safely say. "It seemed so terrifying last year - but simple. Now it's annoying and complicated. Not just trying to stay alive, not even just winning. But what kind of world is the winner even stepping out into?"

She raises her eyebrows at this, but doesn't say anything. There's not much she can say, really. Anyway, the announcement comes to warn us of the time, and I hug her tightly then take my place obediently on the metal plate that will push me up into the arena. The glass tube comes down and, like before, Portia touches her fingers to the glass, mouthing something I can't quite make out. Then, she looks puzzled and turns to look over her shoulder as if a sound of some kind has caught her attention. When she turns back to me, and my plate starts lifting me up, her face is filled with dread.

This is the image I take up with me as the darkness of the tube is replaced by a bright dazzle of light.


	20. Chapter 20

**Chapter Twenty**

* * *

I blink up at the pink sky, where the sun, directly overhead, shines like a white-hot spotlight. As the countdown begins to the start of the games, I try to get my bearings, but I'm on alien ground. I'm standing on water - that is, the metal plate is in the middle of some kind of large lake. Well, more accurately the _cornucopia_ is in the middle of the lake, on a small island of sorts. From the cornucopia, long strips of land radiate, like spokes from the middle of a wheel, to the lake shore. Between cornucopia and shore, in the wedge of water between each spoke, are two tributes. Mags, the elderly tribute from District 4, is in the wedge next to me. Katniss is nowhere near me - probably on the other side of the cornucopia. Of course.

The water is dark blue, hinting at its depth. When the timer hits zero, signifying that it is safe to leave the metal plates, I bend down and let the water splash on my hand so I can taste it. Salt water - it just keeps getting better and better.

So far, no one in my immediate vicinity has taken to the water, so I have some time to ponder my situation. Like me, they probably don't know how to swim. There isn't even so much as a pond in District 12. Wait … I glance over and see that Mags is, in fact, getting ready to jump in. She would know how to swim - or at least keep herself afloat. I'm going to have to get in the water at some point, and try to float myself over to the land strip. But even that's problematic, because - I need to find Katniss. She could be on the opposite side of me, and her land strip would lead her to shore on the far side of the arena. Which means - what? Getting to the cornucopia, to the bloodbath, and hoping to find her there.

I look at Mags again - worried about what she's going to do - and she looks right up at me, points to herself, then back at me, then holds out her palm, as if to say "stop."

I hear the shouting and first sound of weapons hitting each other in the direction of the cornucopia. Well, that didn't take long. Pretty soon, for my own protection, I'm going to have to move, probably just launch myself as far as I can into the direction of the land spoke, then hope I've got enough buoyancy to carry me the rest of the way. Mags slides into the water and disappears for a bit, before her head pops out near the other land spoke.

"Peeta!"

They come from the cornucopia, racing toward me. Katniss - and, of all people, Finnick Odair. Katniss pulls a bow and arrow and aims it, while Finnick dives into the water, coming toward me. I slide off the metal plate and clutch it, waiting for him. The water is surprisingly warm, like bathwater. When he emerges next to me, he holds out a wrist and I see the gold bracelet that Effie gave to Haymitch. So that means ...

I clutch his neck as Finnick swims through the water toward the beach and when we get there, Katniss hauls me up and hugs me.

"Hello, again," I say, kissing her. "We've got allies."

"Yes, just as Haymitch intended," she responds dryly.

"Remind me, did we make deals with anyone else?"

"Only Mags, I think" she says, nodding toward the water. I turn back and see Mags patiently making her way toward us.

"Well, I can't leave Mags behind," says Finnick. "She's one of the few people who actually likes me."

"I've got no problem with Mags," says Katniss, though with a coolness in her voice; she never did warm up to Finnick. "Especially now that I see the arena. Her fish hooks are probably our best chance of getting a meal."

"Katniss wanted her on the first day," I tell Finnick, a little more diplomatically.

"Katniss has remarkably good judgment," he replies, helping Mags onto the beach. She pats her belt and garbles out a nearly unintelligible phrase.

"Look, she's right - someone figured it out." He points out to the water and we see someone, I think Beetee by the flash of light on his glasses, bobbing along in the water a couple of spokes away.

"What?" asks Katniss.

"The belts. They're flotation devices. I mean, you have to propel yourself, but they'll keep you from drowning."

Katniss watches Beetee for a while, then shrugs to herself. She and Finnick distribute the weapons they picked up in the cornucopia. She keeps a bow for herself and several knives. She hands me a machete that is the perfect size for me, a second bow and extra set of arrows and gives Mags an awl. Finnick has a net and several tridents. The net he flings over his shoulders and then he stoops down to let Mags onto his back. Then we run from the open beach into the jungle that surrounds it. Tall trees - smooth, with their fronds of palm leaves clustered up high. There are vines everywhere - snaking across the soft, black earth - hanging in loops from the trees - make walking more of a chore. Humidity - like what it feels like back home right before a summer rain, but multiplied several times - is a warm steam all around us. It's possible we sweat - it's just not possible to be sure that it is our sweat or the sweat of the air.

We decide to go straight up as far as we can, and I take the lead, cutting away creeping vines and vegetation. Finnick's behind me with his trident, but with Mags on his back, it should slow him up if he decides to attack, and Katniss is behind him with her bow drawn.

After about twenty minutes of climbing, Finnick requests a rest and Mags clambers off his back. She's sweating and pale, and I glance at her anxiously, but her concern is for Finnick, and with various hand signals and gestures, she seems to be confirming that he's all right.

"I'm going to try to get a look at the cornucopia," says Katniss, eyeing a tree with bark roughed up enough to provide footholds. She shoots me a glance before she leaves, as if to remind me to be wary of Finnick, before she goes up.

Although I understand why Katniss doesn't trust Finnick, I surprisingly do not have that difficulty. Perhaps it is because now I fully understand Haymitch's message - don't jump right into heroics. And then he sent us Finnick. A better, more eager fighter than me.

And Finnick seems perfectly at ease with me. It's when Katniss slithers down the tree that he tenses and slightly raises his trident. And Katniss' face - set, emotionless - is not encouraging. She almost casually refits an arrow to her bow as soon as she hits the ground, and she stares at him.

"What's going on down there, Katniss?" he asks her in his slightly mocking tone. "Have they all joined hands? Taken a vow of nonviolence? Tossed the weapons in the sea in defiance of the Capitol?"

"No," she answers sullenly.

"No. Because, whatever happened in the past is in the past. And no one in this arena was a victor by chance. Except maybe Peeta," he adds, looking over at me.

He has not convinced her. She is still staring at him, and her thoughts are deadly. I honestly think it might be 50-50 who will be able to strike first, so I rise, calmly walk between the arrow and the trident, and look at Katniss.

"How many are dead?" I ask her.

She glares at me. "Hard to say. At least six, I think. And they're still fighting."

"Let's keep moving," I say, calmly. "We need water."

"Better find some soon," agrees Finnick. "We need to be undercover when the others come hunting us tonight."

Uncertainty passes over Katniss' face and then she finally relaxes. "Let's get going then," she says.

We head back up again, and the trees start bunching together, along with the vegetation, but we keep as close to our straight line as possible. We find no sign of water; it's all just trees and vines, really. Another twenty or thirty minutes in, Katniss points out that we have almost reached the crest of the hill as the tree-line seems to suddenly end just up ahead. I swing the machete back and forth to clear the path. But up at the top of the hill, there is something wrong. I can sense it before understanding it. The jungle up ahead of me does not seem to be stopping. It's no longer climbing, and it's not going downhill. It seems unnaturally - flat. I take one more swing, and the machete hits something that doesn't yield right. The faint, electrical zap is the last thing I hear.

* * *

I come to in darkness. I'm holding my breath. The voices around me are muffled. It's like I'm in a bathtub, holding my nose as I dunk underwater. But the water is light as air. I try to expel it - expel the air in my lungs - but there is something blocking me, a pressure on my mouth. I battle against it, fighting, fighting - and then my breath comes out as a hoarse cough - and suddenly there is Katniss' voice.

"Peeta?"

I blink and light floods my eyes. In a moment of confusion, I think to myself that it is the bird who has found me again. Katniss' golden pin is reflecting the sunlight and her face fills all of my vision, her eyes sparkling, silver bright. It feels so much like waking from a nightmare, or out of death again - paralyzed and tingling. But I can move my fingers. They are still gripped around the knife.

"Careful," I say. "There's a force field up ahead."

She laughs, but tears spill from her eyes, trail down her cheeks and land on my face. She usually doesn't cry like this, and certainly never in public. She's always been fairly stoic in the arena.

"Must be a lot stronger than the one on the Training Center roof," I continue, puzzled. "I'm all right, though. Just a little shaken."

"You were dead!" she exclaims. "Your heart stopped!" Then she puts her hand over her mouth and I can see she's trying to contain her sobs, but they are escaping her anyway, a choking sound.

Oh - well. Oh. "Well, it seems to be working now," I say soothingly. "It's all right, Katniss." She nods, but she won't take her hand off of her mouth and I feel the anxiety of the arena around me, the need to keep moving. "Katniss?"

"It's OK. It's just her hormones," says Finnick, who is kneeling on the ground behind her.

"No. It's not -" she starts. And then she really starts to cry. I just hold on to her hand, not sure what else to do. This is not a Katniss that I know. No amount of playing to the camera would ever draw out such a performance from her. I must have genuinely frightened her. And now I'm uneasy. I'm going to have to die at some point - and yes, of course, she won't be happy about it. But she must also not be so vulnerable.

She looks up at Finnick with a strange mix of resentment and gratitude - by which I take it that I have him to thank for reviving me - and he looks from her to me with more of a puzzled look, then shakes his head.

"How are you?" he asks me. "Do you think you can move on?"

"No, he has to rest," says Katniss, firmly, before I can say a word. Mags brings her a handful of moss, which she uses to wipe her face. She blows her nose and wipes all the tears and snot away. Then, she looks back at me and frowns. She reaches over and pulls the locket out from under the undershirt and stares at it for a second. I hold my breath, but she doesn't open it. "Is this your token?" she asks.

"Yes. Do you mind that I used your mockingjay? I wanted us to match."

"No, of course I don't mind," she says with something of a forced smile. I suppress a smile of my own - I _thought_ she might find the matching thing a bit too cute. Thank goodness she didn't seem to realize it was a locket.

I spend a moment reflecting on how much I love her utter lack of sentimentalism. I really do. I always admired it and I have come to take strength in it. Certainly, as with most things, its absence is as telling as its presence. So, I know that when she weeps for me, I am witnessing something real - and incredibly rare. (She, on the other hand, must find my own sentiments hard to follow. As real as my feelings are, I've had to dress them up and parade them around so much, sometimes even I forget what part I'm playing at any given moment - friend, lover, husband, ally … it all gets to be a jumble, sometimes.)

"So, do you want to make camp here, then?" asks Finnick, with a touch of exasperation.

"I don't think that's an option," I say, before Katniss can speak. "Staying here. With no water. No protection. I feel all right, really. If we could just go slowly."

"Slowly would be better than not at all," says Finnick, and he helps me up.

Katniss starts picking over her weapons. Counting her arrows. Checking her knives. Finally, she stands. "I'll take the lead."

"No," I say, "it's too -."

"No, let her do it," says Finnick. "You knew that force field was there, didn't you? Right at the last second? You started to give a warning." Katniss nods. "How did you know?"

Katniss hesitates. It might not be obvious to Finnick, because it's so brief, but I've seen it too many times - she's trying to decide whether or not to tell the truth. "I don't know," she says at last. "It's almost as if I could hear it. Listen."

We stand still for a while, but I hear nothing but chattering insects and the wind rustling the vines. "I don't hear anything."

"Yes," she insists, looking at me very earnestly. "It's like when the fence around District 12 is on, only much, much quieter." We pause to listen again. I squint at Katniss, wondering what game she's playing. "There! Can't you hear it? It's coming from right where Peeta got shocked."

"I don't hear it, either, but if you do, by all means, take the lead," says Finnick.

"That's weird," Katniss responds. She cocks first her right then her left ear in the direction of the force field. "I can only hear it out of my left ear."

"The one the doctors reconstructed?" I ask,

"Yeah," she shrugs. "Maybe they did a better job than they thought."

I wish I could say the same thing about my prosthetic leg, which feels off now, probably because my muscles are still quivering and it needs strong support from my upper leg. Finnick finds me a stick to use for walking. But my left foot drags and I catch on every single vine.

Katniss grabs a bunch of nuts from one of the smaller trees and uses them to periodically toss to her left side, to make sure we are keeping free of the force field. Just ahead of me, Mags collects the nuts she throws, which are blackened from the shock. After a while, Katniss turns around in consternation. "Mags! Spit that out! It could be poisonous."

Mags shakes her head and says something unintelligible. Katniss looks back to Finnick, who is now bringing up the rear, but he just laughs. "I guess we'll find out," he shrugs.

Mags seems OK, so we keep plodding on. I know Katniss is hoping that there is a place where the force field will allow us to turn left, crest the hill and leave the trees, but I'm beginning to think that there is no way this is going to happen. We seem to be following a curved path, as far as I can tell.

After an hour, we have made no progress beyond the trees and, in frustration, Katniss calls for a break and says she needs to take another look from above. She finds a tall tree and shimmies up it, while the rest of us sit down. We're all panting - even the exertion of walking slowly has winded us and we are absolutely leeching body moisture. My tongue feels swollen and dry.

"Feeling OK, Mags?" asks Finnick with a laugh.

Mags returns the laugh and rubs her belly.

I squint at Finnick. "Uh - thanks, by the way. That might be an arena first - bringing your opponent back to life."

He shrugs. "Ally," he says shortly. "So - just don't pull that stunt again at the end of the game."

"I'll try."

At that point, Katniss slithers back down the tree and, huffing a little, sits down next to me. "The force field has us trapped in a circle. A dome, really. I don't know how high it goes. There's the cornucopia, the sea, and then the jungle all around. Very exact. Very symmetrical. And not very large."

I nod to myself. This makes a certain sense, given our experiences, so far. Still, it's disconcerting to be trapped in such a small space with a bunch of tributes who you can't really trust.

"Did you see any water?" asks Finnick.

"Only the saltwater where we started the Games."

"There must be some other source," I say. "Or we'll all be dead in a matter of days."

Katniss shakes her head. "Well, the foliage is thick. Maybe there are ponds or springs somewhere." But she sounds unenthusiastic. "At any rate, there's no point in trying to find out what's over the edge of this hill, because the answer's nothing."

Just like Haymitch's cliff. "There must be drinkable water between the force field and the wheel," I insist.

Katniss considers me for a moment, and then sighs. Because she knows I'm right. Either there is no water, and we have to return to the center of the arena and finish the fight as soon as possible before dying of thirst - or there is water hidden in here and we have to find it. "Let's be logical about this. We'll move down the slope a couple hundred yards and continue going around the circle."

We spend the rest of the day on this exercise, but it's slow going. Mags can go only so fast - and I'm little faster. I don't want to tell Katniss, because I don't want to be the one to trap her in any one location, again, but my nausea is kept in check only by the fact that I don't have much in my stomach to expel.

After a couple of hours of this, though, with no luck, anyway, Katniss at one point turns around to check on us, and she immediately calls a halt to the day. "We need to rest," she says.

"Let's hike a little ways back up," says Finnick. "If we camp just below the force field, we know that's one direction we don't have to watch, plus we can use it as a weapon - deflect attackers into it."

Katniss glances at me and I think we have the same thought - Finnick is an incredibly useful ally. I nod, and she says, "OK, sounds good."

Once we find a place to rest, Finnick starts picking armfuls of the large grasses that grow all around us, and he and Mags start weaving them together. I see a bunch of the nuts that Katniss was using to test the force field, cut them down and fry them against the force field. As I peel and pile the nuts, Katniss stands over me, leaning on her bow.

"Finnick," she says at last. "Why don't you stand guard and I'll hunt around for some water."

"No," I start. "Not alone."

"Don't worry, I won't go far.

"I'll go, too."

"No," she says, staring me down. "I'm going to do some hunting if I can."

She knows I have no good argument against this, since I'm too loud to go with her when she hunts. Although, I really think she means to leave me behind because I need to rest. I start to insist she take Finnick with her, but I know she won't go for that, because in our current condition, Mags and I are even more vulnerable than she is. Damn it.

I watch her dissolve into the trees with an uneasy feeling, which is not helped by the sudden sound of the cannon. But it's just the announcement - finally - of the end of the bloodbath. Hours, that took, although I suppose, with the water and the island, it makes sense that the initial fighting might have taken a lot longer than usual. Eight. Quick flashes of last year's bloodbath - the dead children lying in the plain. Quick flashes of the training center - how we laughed, ate, had fun with each other.

Finnick shakes his head. "Kumbaya," he says, wryly - a word with no meaning to me - and Mags shakes her head in turn.

Mags and Finnick go back to work on their weaving. The tall grasses make mats three or four feet high, and after they have made four big mats - with such speed that I know they must do this all the time - Finnick loosens up some tall, thin, sturdy reeds and constructs a frame. The mats, secured on the top and three sides of the frame, complete a small hut - not tall enough to stand in, but wide enough for the four of us to sit in. And they're not done. While Finnick constructs the hut, Mags weaves smaller grasses into bowls. She hands them to me, and I start filling them with nuts.

After what seems like far too long, Katniss comes back, so silently that we don't hear her until she's almost upon us. She takes in the transformation of the camp, and we take in her hands, in which she is carrying a very large, almost beaver-sized, rodent.

"No, no water," she says, looking at our hopeful faces. "It's out there though," she says, looking at me with a small smile. "He knew where it was," she adds, indicating the rat. "He'd been drinking recently when I shot him out of a tree, but I couldn't find his source. I swear, I covered every inch of ground in a thirty-yard radius."

"Can we eat him?" I ask her.

"I don't know for sure. But his meat doesn't look that different from a squirrel's. He should be cooked …." She frowns at this.

I'm good at starting fires in even damp conditions, but it would be a horrible risk to take when heat is not even needed. Then I look down at my hands. "Let's use the force field."

Katniss skins the tree-rat and I cut the meat into cubes, skewer the cubes on a sharp stick, and toss it into the force field. After a second or two of sizzle against the field, the stick flies back at me and I catch it. The rodent meat is blackened on all sides, but cooked nicely inside. The next time, I try it with slightly larger cubes of flesh, and that works the same, but gives us much more meat to chew on.

We gather together inside the little hut to eat tree rat and fried nuts. It's a strange meal - but actually, not bad, all things considered, the rat tasting like muddy chicken, the nuts slightly sweet, slightly bitter - and that takes care of hunger. But hunger's not the real problem.

After we eat, Finnick interrogates Katniss a little bit about the rat - where it was going, how high it was, what it was doing when she shot it. Katniss' answers are brief, and she occasionally gives Finnick a distrustful look - he's being a little too aggressive, again - but I think that he's just detail-oriented, that he likes to understand things, even if he doesn't see them.

Beyond the border of the trees, the sun sets and, as it does, the light of a large, pale moon starts shining through the trees on the other side of the sky. As darkness descends, the anthem of Panem sounds, and the Capitol seal appears in the sky above us. Followed by the faces of today's dead.

The man from District 5. The male morphling from 6. Cecelia and Woof, the tributes from 8. Both from 9. The woman from 10. Seeder from 11. I'm surprised to find a lump in my throat. I don't want to know how they died - the gentle, drugged-out artist; the tough 60-year-old woman. The mother of three.

No one speaks. Katniss looks tense and on the verge of tears again. I'm about to try to say something comforting to her, when we see it all of a sudden. A silver parachute - a gift from our sponsors - glides down to rest in the nearby foliage.

"Whose is it?" asks Katniss.

Finnick shrugs. "No telling. Why don't we let Peeta claim it, since he died today?"

I go over and pick it up. The gift we have been sent is very small. It's a small, hollow, metal object, a little longer than a finger, with a tapered end - kind of like the mouth-end of a whistle. None of us can place it. We blow on it, ask Mags if she can fish with it,consider its merits as a weapon.

Katniss takes it, finally, and spends a lot of time just looking at it, as if trying to read the mind of the sender. I guess I'm seeing it in action, then - her silent communication game with Haymitch. Where he sends her gifts and she figures out the meaning of them. Only, this time, neither the meaning nor purpose come to her.

She finally lays her head on a grass mat and sticks the object in the sand with a grunt. "I give up. Maybe if we hook up with Beetee or Wiress they can figure it out."

I sit down behind her and rub her shoulders, which are tense with her frustration. The motion of my fingers helps keep my mind off of the headache that is starting to pound behind my eyes. Surely, I think, when it comes down to it, Haymitch will eventually make sure we get water. And forget us - Finnick's legions of wealthy fans won't let him die this way.

Suddenly, Katniss sits straight up. "A spile!"

"What?" asks Finnick.

Katniss pulls it out of the ground. "It's a spile. Sort of like a faucet you put in a tree - and sap comes out." She looks around. "Well, the right kind of tree."

"Sap?" asks Finnick.

"To make syrup," I explain hastily, because I understand now … "But there must be something else inside these trees."

The rat, nuzzling the tree, as Katniss described so carefully to Finnick. Its mouth wet with recent drinking.

We jump up and go to a thick, green tree. Finnick takes the spile and starts to drive into the bark with a rock, but Katniss stops him. "Wait, you might damage it. Let's drill the hole, first."

Mags offers her awl and I drive it into the bark. It's nice and sharp and goes in two inches with little difficulty. I try to widen the hole by moving the awl around in it, and then Finnick helps with a knife, and eventually, we get the spile into the tree.

After a few tense seconds, water begins to drip from the end of it. Mags catches the first drops and licks them off her palm. She nods and holds her hands out for more.

After some wiggling and adjusting of the spile, a thin stream of water pours out of it. We take turns drinking right from it, then Mags brings over one of her woven baskets, which is watertight. The water is warm - a little earthy - but so delicious. My headache retreats and the only thing I feel once I've had my fill of it is sleepy.

Katniss lets Finnick take the first watch and lies beside me, our heads covered by the hut. "How are you doing?" she whispers to me.

"Fine - just so tired."

She adjusts herself so that her body is spooning mine. Her rhythmic breathing calms and relaxes me, as hypnotic as a lullaby. "You'll be better in the morning," she tells me gently.

I slip away, slip towards unconsciousness, wondering what dreams will come to me my first night in the arena. Will they be regular nightmares? The ones that paralyze me upon waking? My last waking moments are spent listening to my own heartbeat.


	21. Chapter 21

**Chapter Twenty-One**

* * *

I wake to Katniss' screams.

"Run!" she shouts. "Run!"

I sense movement to my left - Finnick jumping up and picking up Mags with one swift motion. My limbs are moving very slowly - I feel more sluggish than I should. I grab my knife, struggle to my feet, and am yanked forward by Katniss before I can even process what is going on. We stumble into the trees, following Finnick. "What is it? What is it?"

"Some kind of fog. Poisonous gas. Hurry, Peeta!" she cries in panic.

I glance back and see a wall of misty fog heading straight towards us - moving with unnatural speed. Then I trip on some vines.

Katniss keeps me from stumbling to the ground and she takes my hand. "Watch my feet. Just try to step where I step."

I nod mutely and do as she says. But we can't outrun the fog. When it touches the heel of my good foot, I understand what she means by poisonous. I feel a sharp burning sensation, and a numbing pain crawl up my ankle, so now it feels like I am running on two artificial feet. This confuses the prosthetic leg, which over time I have trained to follow the motions of the other. It catches on some vines and I fall on my face. I try to call out for Katniss to go, to leave me, but I can't move my mouth.

"Peeta -" she begins, then screams and clutches her arm.

She yanks me right up and after her, and I get tangled up in her feet and we both almost go down. As I straighten up, I see that her arms are twitching. And my feet will not go in the same direction as each other. Katniss wedges her shoulder under my right arm and pulls me forward. We've caught up to Finnick, who has stopped to wait for us, and when I look back, the fog is a little further behind us, but still coming.

"I'll have to carry him," says Finnick. "Can you take Mags?"

"Yes."

Finnick heaves me on his back and puts one of his tridents in my hand. Everything from there on out is like a nightmare. I cling to Finnick's back - slowing him down. Mags clings to Katniss - slowing her down. Or the world has slowed down. My mind feels like it is filled with the fog, and that I'm floating.

Katniss cries out and Finnick stops. "Come on, Katniss!"

We move again, but a second time, a third, Finnick stops and calls out to Katniss.

"It's no use," I hear her say. "Can you take them both? Go on ahead, I'll catch up."

"No, I can't carry them both. My arms aren't working. I'm sorry, Mags."

Vaguely, I'm aware of Mags standing straight and coming over to Finnick. She reaches up to his face and kisses him, then turns around to walk right into the approaching fog.

I hear the cannon, though it's muffled by the fogginess in my head.

"Finnick?" cries Katniss, but he is turning away, leaving her, running again through the trees.

And then, without warning, he collapses to the ground, twitching. I land on top of him. And Katniss falls on top of me.

In the silence that precedes our certain death by poison, Finnick moans once and Katniss manages to push herself off of us. She says, "It's stopped. It's stopped."

I turn my head and look up in time to see the fog, which is now a dense wall, rise up and evaporate into the night air. I roll off of Finnick, and he manages to roll over, but his whole body is twitching. A flash of orange in the moonlit trees catches my eye, and I squint up to see it - a furry creature perched up in the tree. It's not a rat or a squirrel. It squats, child-sized, and not unlike in form. With the faintest rustle, another one joins the first to look down at me.

I didn't think such things existed for real - at least, not anymore. "Monkeys," I say, pointing.

After we all spend a couple of minutes staring at each other, I test my muscles. I find I can crawl, which is good, because it is unlikely I will be able to walk. Looking around, I see that Finnick led us close to the water, and that seems like a good place to go. Katniss and Finnick follow, and we struggle down until we've reached the beach.

The touch of the water hurts - stings even worse than the poisons. But after the initial sting, there is some relief. And where my skin has blistered from the touch of the poison, a milky substance escapes into the water. That seems encouraging. Looking over, I see that Katniss seems to have discovered the same, as she has taken off her jumpsuit and is dunking and scrubbing one limb at a time. I follow her lead. The suit is useless now, completely full of holes. Down to one layer - the soft cotton shorts and shirt - I'm as comfortable in the warm air here as I'm ever likely to be, anyway. Katniss puts the purple flotation belt back on and so do I.

Wordlessly, Katniss and I turn to Finnick, who has not followed us into the water. He seems worse than I ever felt. Katniss pours handfuls of water on him, while I cut away his wasted jumpsuit. Then I find some shells to carry water. His pained moans at the touch of the salt water pierce the quiet air and we both glance toward the water and the shadow of the Cornucopia, nervously.

"We've got to get more of him into the water," Katniss whispers.

We grab his feet and turn him around so that we can get him feet-first into the water. Slowly, bit-by-bit, we pull him further into the water, until finally we have him immersed to his neck.

"There's just your head left, Finnick," I tell him softly. "That's the worst part, but you'll feel much better after, if you can bear it."

Katniss and I hold his hands as he dunks his face.

"I'm going to tap a tree," Katniss says.

"Let me make the hole first," I tell her. "You stay with him. You're the healer."

She looks reluctant, but I rise and head back up the beach before she can object. I only go a little way into the trees before I find a nice, big one. Mags had the awl, and presumably took it into the fog with her, so I have to chip and dig into the tree with a sharp corner of my machete blade. It's awkward going, but I've almost got a solid hole, when Katniss' voice makes me jump.

"Peeta, I need your help with something."

"OK, just a minute, I think I've just about got it. Yes, there. Have you got the spile?"

"I do. But we've found something you'd better take a look at. Only, move toward us quietly, so you don't startle it."

I turn slowly to her, alerted by her tone to some trouble. I don't see anything but her and Finnick standing just inside the tree line, weapons out. "OK," I say. I take careful steps toward them and I can see Katniss wincing at the sound of my footfalls. Finnick is looking past me, slightly over my shoulder, and I'm tingling to look behind me to see what the danger is, but I resist the temptation. But there's another one of those orange flashes above my head and I glance up automatically.

There's a screech and, in a split second, a mass of orange bodies descends on me. Before I can even think about it, I swing my knife above me, defensively, and a mutt - for that's what it must be - is impaled on it.

Katniss and Finnick run up to me and her arrows and his trident join the battle. Wherever I swing, I hit a mutt. I hear Katniss' arrows whiz past my ears and hit target after target.

We form a triangle, backs to each other, a few yards apart, and as the numbers decrease, we are able to move further apart, pushing them back from us.

"Peeta!" screams Katniss. "Your arrows!"

I turn and see that Katniss is out of arrows and has just one of her small knives out. I still have a spare bow and quiver. I start pushing the quiver off of my left shoulder. Katniss gives another cry, and I look up to see a mutt flying straight toward me. Katniss is jumping toward me, with I think the intention of throwing herself between me and the mutt and I can't untangle my knife fast enough to defend the both of us….

Then, out of nowhere, out of the shadows of the trees behind me, the morphling woman steps out and in front of me, her arms open wide as the mutt lands on her and sinks its fangs into her chest.

Fuck!

I don't know if I scream it out loud or only think it. In a frenzy, I finish pushing the quiver off of me and plunge the machete into the mutt's back. Then again in the neck. And again. Until it finally releases its jaws from the woman.

"Come on then! Come on!" I scream at the mutts. But no more are coming. They are, in fact, withdrawing. Slouching back into the trees. As if, by making the kill, they have carried out their mission and are being called away.

"Get her," Katniss tells me. "We'll cover you."

The morphling is light in my arms as I carry her down to the beach. She's not dead yet. But her breathing is raspy and coarse. I lay her on the sand near the water and stare at her thin, gaunt face in the moonlight. She grabs at me and I take one of her hands. "It's OK," I tell her, emptily.

Katniss joins me and cuts away the wetsuit at her chest, and we can see the deep puncture wounds and the dark blood staining her undershirt. She takes the woman's other hand and looks at me, shaking her head. I thought as much.

"I'll watch the trees," says Finnick.

I can feel all the bones in the woman's hand. What a horrifying waste of a life. How many years did she enjoy - if that's the right word - the fruits of her victory before sliding into this state? Or maybe she was happier there, in that twilight world? Content to just take her drugs and do her painting.

I stroke her brittle hair. "With my paint box at home, I can make every color imaginable. Pink as pale as a baby's skin. Or as deep as rhubarb. Green like spring grass. Blue that shimmers like ice on water."

The woman stares into my eyes. I sense Katniss looking at me, as well. But I understand people who think in colors.

"One time, I spent three days mixing paint until I found the right shade for sunlight on white fur. You see, I kept thinking it was yellow, but it was much more than that. Layers of all sorts of color. One by one."

She wiggles her hand out of mine and swirls a finger in the blood pooling on her chest.

"I haven't figured out a rainbow, yet," I continue, my head exploding with colors - my heart aching for the paints I will never return to. I wasn't _done_ yet. "They come so quickly and leave so soon. I never have enough time to capture them. Just a bit of blue here or purple there. And then they fade away again. Back into the air."

I hold her eyes, even as she lifts her hand and swirls my cheek with her blood, in a finger-painting motion.

"Thank you. That looks beautiful."

For just a second, lucidity returns to the woman's eyes. A smile returns to her face. In the fading light of her life, you can catch a glimpse of the girl she was before her reaping. She makes a small sound, as if an answer to me. But her hand falls and the cannon sounds.

After a moment, I carry her out into the water and let her float away from us. The hovercraft to take her out of the arena won't appear if we are too close, and this beach is narrow, and the jungle too dangerous. I sit down next to Katniss and watch until the hovercraft appears, lowers a heavy claw, and plucks the morphling out of the water. I wish I knew her name. And why she sacrificed herself for me.

Finnick rejoins us and hands Katniss the arrows, which he has collected from the jungle. She washes them off and then goes back up toward the trees. Right after she enters the trees, there is a strange, snaky sound, and Finnick and I stand up in alarm. The floor of the jungle seems to writhe around for a little, the vines moving on their own. It's so reminiscent of my tracker jacker hallucinations that I experience a moment of dizziness. Then the strange movement ends and everything is back to normal, except that the orange monkey corpses have disappeared.

Katniss comes back down to the beach with a clump of moss to dry her arrows. When she asks where the monkeys went, Finnick and I just look at each other.

"We don't know exactly. The vines shifted and they were gone," he explains.

We stand, looking at the jungle with wary eyes. I notice suddenly that my hands are itching and, looking down, see that my arms and hands are covered with tiny little scabs. Probably the wounds from the fog drops healing over, but very annoying. I reach up to my face and I can feel them there too. I look over at the others and see we are all taken with the same realization.

"Don't scratch," says Katniss, sternly. "You'll only bring infection. Think it's safe to try for the water again?"

This time, the three of us go back to the tree I had just finished tapping. I wriggle the spile into the tree, and this one gushes forth. There must be gallons of water inside it. We both drink our fill and wash our itching faces. I run back to find the shells we used on Finnick and we fill them up to take back to the beach.

Back on the beach, Katniss squints up at the moon, as if trying to figure out what time it is. "Why don't you two get some rest?" she says. "I'll watch for a while."

"No, Katniss, I'd rather," says Finnick, with a slight choke to his voice. He's thinking about Mags.

"All right, Finnick, thanks," she says. By the warmth in her voice, she's undergone a sea change in terms of her trust in him. This will make things difficult later on, but there's definitely no way Katniss and I would have survived the last two encounters on our own.

I have a long, long sleep in which even the nightmares seem exhausted and fade away before they can scare me awake. The last thing I remember dreaming about is of the Remake Center, and my prep team has put some kind of lotion on me and my whole body is turning red and itchy.

"Peeta. Peeta, wake up." Her beautiful voice - strangely cheerful, like a morning bird.

I blink my eyes open, and I see two faces staring at me close up. They are green-skinned monstrosities, crusted over with gray scabs. I jump up with a shout, knocking over a mat that was shading my head.

Finnick and Katniss fall backward in the sand, laughing hysterically. And continue to laugh like toddlers every time they pause and see me frowning at them. They don't stop until a parachute drifts down to land in front of us, and I pick it up. It contains a small loaf of bread. Tinted green from seaweed - District 4 bread. I hand it to Finnick and he turns it over in his hands.

"This will go well with the shellfish," he says, and I see that he's been busy. Besides the mat, he's woven more baskets and filled them with shellfish - oysters, small crabs and mussels, if I remember right. I've only ever had seafood in the Capitol.

"Come on, Peeta," says Katniss. "Haymitch sent us some lotion for the scabs. See, you've been itching in your sleep. You'll get an infection and -."

"Yes, yes - blood poisoning," I finish. "I remember," I add with a grin. The ointment smells like tar and pine, and it smears on my skin an unattractive brown-green color. But it numbs the skin enough to make the itching go away. Katniss rubs it on the exposed parts of my arms and neck, then takes a little too much delight in making me close my eyes and painting it on my face. She hands me the jar so I can do my legs, and she's grinning at me.

"What?"

"Your eyes are the same."

I cock my head at her, puzzled.

"Just like when you were in the mud."

"Oh," I reply, blushing for some reason that I can't even understand – but my blush is hidden behind the ointment.

We feast on Finnick's bread and shellfish. Afterward, I notice Katniss again studying the sky, trying to figure out the time. Studying the trees, trying to figure out the jungle. There has been no sign on all this ring of beach or at the cornucopia of any other tributes. So, they all seem to be keeping to the jungle. The jungle, which seems rigged with multiple traps. Following along with her thoughts, I watch her absently pick up a handful of sand and let it stream out between her fingers. If we could stay on the beach - if we could defend ourselves here - this would be an ideal place to stay. That's what she's thinking. Especially if the jungle is doing the unpleasant job of killing tributes for us.

At that, there is a shimmering, humming, from the jungle on the other side of the cornucopia from us. One small section of trees is vibrating - and then there is a scream. We jump to our feet as a wave of water appears to crest the hill - where we know the force field meets the jungle - and comes roaring downhill. The wave of water hits the salt lake and the lake boils up in a surf that is strong enough to reach our own little beach on the opposite side. The water engulfs the beach and rises as high as our knees, before it recedes. Our camp starts floating away and we hurry to collect everything we want to save - Finnick's mats and baskets, the little jar of ointment, our water-collecting shells, our weapons. The chemical-laced wetsuits and the remnants of our shellfish meal float away, useless to anyone now.

A cannon fires and whoever was caught up in the wave on the far side of us is picked up by the hovercraft. "Twelve," says Katniss softly. We're half down.

We set everything up again on the damp sand and I sit down and start rubbing my knee and down to the prosthetic.

"Do you need to take it off for a while?"

I shake my head. "No - it's just a little uncomfortable. But it's not worth it, in case we have to move in a hurry." I resist the temptation to make a joke about how little it's going to matter in a few days. Then distract myself by wondering if I will be buried with or without it.

Katniss stiffens. "There," she hisses, nodding down the beach.

I look over and see that three people - or something - have stumbled out onto the beach a couple hundred yards down from us. One is dragging a second out onto the beach and the third is walking around in dizzy circles. The weird thing is that they are all solid red in color, which makes them look like someone dumped buckets of paint on them. "Who is that? Or what? Muttations?"

Katniss fits an arrow to her bow. We watch as the person being dragged collapses to the sand and the dragger stamps the ground and shoves the third down to the sand.

Finnick stirs. "Johanna!" he cries, and runs down the beach.

"Finnick!" It's definitely her.

Katniss looks at me, and her look is fully exasperated. "What now?" she asks.

"We can't really leave Finnick," I reply.

Katniss muses over this for a moment, as if seriously considering ditching Finnick now and dragging me off into the trees. "Guess not," she finally says, grumpily. "Come on, then." She stamps off down the beach and I follow her, thinking, well she didn't like Finnick at first, either. "She's got Wiress and Beetee."

"Nuts and Volts? I've got to hear how this happened."

When we reach them, Beetee is lying on the sand, Wiress is walking in circles and Johanna is gesticulating excitedly as she talks to Finnick. "We thought it was rain, you know, because of the lightning, and we were all so thirsty. But when it started coming down, it turned out to be blood. Thick, hot blood. You couldn't see, you couldn't speak without getting a mouthful. We just staggered around, trying to get out of it. That's when Blight hit the force field."

"I'm sorry, Johanna," says Finnick.

"Yeah well, he wasn't much, but he was from home," she replies shortly. "And he left me alone with these two." She nudges Beetee with her foot. "He got a knife in the back at the cornucopia. And her-."

We look at Wiress, who murmurs. "Tick tock, tick tock."

"Yeah, we know. Tick tock. Nuts is in shock," Johanna says, rolling her eyes. Wiress wanders over and bumps into her, and she shoves her away from her, knocking Wiress to the ground. "Just stay down, will you?"

Katniss, who has been tense throughout all of this, suddenly snaps. "Lay off her."

Johanna narrows her eyes. "Lay off her?" She steps up and slaps Katniss, hard. I grab Katniss before she reacts - her arm is reaching automatically behind her for an arrow. And Finnick steps up to Johanna. "Who do you think got them out of that bleeding jungle for you? You-." Finnick tosses her over his shoulder as if she weighs no more than Mags, and carries her out into the water. "You pampered, painted bitch!" The rest of Johanna's insults are lost to us as she is dunked, repeatedly.

"Are you OK?"

"What did she mean? She got them for me?"

I shake my head. "I don't know. You did want them originally." I don't say so, but this must be more of Haymitch's work.

"Yeah, I did. Originally. But I won't have them long, unless we do something."

I lift Beetee and Katniss pulls Wiress up and we take them back down the beach to our little camp. I take a look at Beetee's knife wound, while Katniss sets Wiress down in the shallows. Then Katniss joins me, and purses her lips. She unhooks his belt and removes a heavy cylinder attached to it with a rope of vines. She tosses it up the sand. "Let's get him to the water."

We hold him down in the shallows and scrub the blood out of his hair and off his wetsuit. When we remove it, we find his underclothes saturated with blood, as well. Katniss gives a sigh and glances at me. I smile – thinking of her reluctance to strip me in the arena last year - and pull off his shorts, while she pulls off his shirt. She puts Beetee's clothes in the water, under a rock so they can soak without floating away, then goes to get Finnick's mat. We lift Beetee onto it and she examines his back. There's a long gash running from his shoulder blades to his middle back.

"It's not too deep," she says, "nothing vital was punctured. But he's lost a lot of blood." She looks out over the water, then back towards the jungle. "Be right back."

I watch her run into the trees - not too far, I can still see her. She comes back out with an armful of moss and some vines and I sit back and watch her, fascinated, as she pads the moss over his wound and secures it with vines. My memory of her doctoring me in the last arena is vague, at best, and from a different perspective. She wordlessly points to our shells, and I collect some water in them and bring them back to her and prop Beetee up while she coaxes him to drink. Then we bring him up out of the water and set him in the shade at the edge of the trees.

"I think that's all we can do," she says.

"It's good. You're good with this healing stuff," I say, feeling more than a little in awe of her. "It's in your blood."

"No," she says, as always denying this. "I got my father's blood. I'm going to see about Wiress."

I collect more water as she goes back down to the lake and starts scrubbing Wiress down with another piece of moss, and helping her strip her blood-soaked clothes. And I think - this is what she would be, if our world wasn't so fucked up. She hunts from necessity. It's not what she was meant to do. Because even though she hasn't made a study of it, even though she blanches at pus and pauses before being able to look at a naked body, even a wounded one - the instinct is in her.

Finnick and Johanna join us - Johanna in her underclothes, which makes her look somewhat less threatening. I eye Katniss warily as she returns with Wiress, also newly clean and redressed. I hand Johanna one of the shells of water.

"Thanks, Lover Boy," she says to me with a wink. Katniss' eyes narrow and Finnick hastily passes a basket of shellfish her way. Katniss takes the other basket and tries unsuccessfully to get Wiress to eat.

"What happened to Mags?" asks Johanna directly.

Finnick coughs, then proceeds to recount our overnight adventures - the fog, the monkeys. He doesn't mention specifically how Mags died, just that she didn't make it. Johanna narrows her eyes, but doesn't ask for an elaboration.

"We should rest," says Katniss.

"I don't need it," says Johanna abruptly. "I'll keep watch."

Katniss rolls her eyes. She's not going to trust Johanna with a watch by herself.

"I slept in, I can keep watch," I volunteer.

Katniss shakes her head. "I slept in almost as much. You still haven't got a full rest since the force field." She avoids my eyes, so I don't know if it's that she's worried about me being overpowered by Johanna or if she's rankled over the "Lover Boy" comment. She is right, though, I'm still tired. And my left leg is sore in a very problematic way. I can tell by her face that she's not to be argued with - if I know her, she's not only going to try to figure out Johanna, but also rethink her own strategy with the new wrinkle of our suddenly-crowded allegiance. With twelve tributes left, suddenly our pack is half of the field.

"Fine," I concede.

Finnick has already stretched out in the shade near Beetee, and I find a nearby spot and lie down, clutching my knife. Katniss comes over to me and kneels over me for a moment, staring down at me before - almost grudgingly - bending down to kiss my cheek.

"Be nice," I whisper.

"Be good and sleep - Lover Boy," she whispers back.


	22. Chapter 22

**Chapter Twenty-Two**

* * *

Before I can even settle into dreams, Katniss is shaking me awake, and I startle up, gripping my knife. "Get up - we have to move," she's saying.

I jump up, feeling vaguely alarmed, but there is no obvious danger. Everyone is grumbling at Katniss - including Johanna, who apparently changed her mind about staying awake.

"Listen - Wiress figured out the arena," says Katniss, exasperatedly. "So, we have to move. Look - the twelve spokes that go to the cornucopia. It's a clock. And each section of the arena -each wedge between the spokes - is triggered at a different time of day." She points across to the opposite beach. "You know how the wave came out of just that section of the jungle? That was about ten o'clock. The lightning just struck there - noon. The blood rain was next, after the lightning - 1 o'clock? The fog section was after the rain - I heard the rain, right before the fog started last night. And we're in the next section, where the monkeys are. That's why the fog ended and the monkeys retreated. We moved out of the fog segment - and the monkeys left when their hour was up."

I shade my eyes and look over at the cornucopia. It does make a certain kind of sense. I notice the cornucopia tail is pointed directly at what Katniss says is the twelve o'clock sector. "But are we safe from the different traps on the beach?" I ask. "The monkeys never went past the tree line."

"Some of them, maybe. I don't know. The wave doesn't stay in the jungle. What if the fog doesn't?"

"You're right. Anyway, it wouldn't hurt to keep ahead of the clock by a couple of hours, at least," I say.

"It sounds crazy to me," says Johanna, skeptically.

Katniss deliberately ignores her. She bends down to rouse Wiress.

"Come on, Beetee," I say, helping him up and back into his jumpsuit.

Wiress wakes up with a panicked, "Tick tock!"

"Yes, tick tock," says Katniss. "It's a clock, Wiress. You were right."

Wiress' face relaxes into a smile. "Midnight."

Katniss nods. "It starts at midnight." Then she frowns to herself.

"One-thirty," adds Wiress, looking up at the sky.

"Exactly. And at two, a terrible poisonous fog begins, there," Katniss confirms, pointing down the beach. "So, we have to move somewhere safe, now. Are you thirsty?"

She hands Wiress the bowl of water, and she gulps it down, and eats the last of the District 4 bread. Katniss goes over her weapons. I keep the extra bow, but she has both quivers now, and several knives. She wraps the spile and the skin medicine up in the parachute and ties it to her belt with a vine. I bend down and pick up an enormous leaf she brought out with her along with the moss and vines. Not that it matters too much if we're being tracked, but you never know. I fold it up and stick it beneath the belt.

Once we're ready, I bend down to pick up Beetee, but he objects. "Wire."

"She's right here - Wiress is fine. She's coming, too."

"Wire," Beetee insists.

"Oh, I know what he wants," says Johanna suddenly. She picks up the cylinder we took from Beetee when we bathed him. It's still coated in a heavy layer of dried blood. "This worthless thing. It's some kind of wire or something. That's how he got cut. Running up to the Cornucopia to get this. I don't know what kind of weapon it's supposed to be. I guess you could pull off a piece and use it as a garrote or something. But really, can you imagine Beetee garroting somebody?"

It's a long, somewhat convoluted insult, especially for blunt Johanna. I wonder if she's being deliberately obtuse or if she just can't help herself when it comes to tweaking Nuts and Volts. "He won his Games with wire," I say. "Setting up that electrical trap. It's the best weapon he could have."

"Seems like you'd have figured that out," Katniss adds. "Since you nicknamed him Volts and all."

Johanna glares at her. "Yeah, that was really stupid of me, wasn't it? I guess I must have been distracted by keeping your little friends alive. While you were … what again? Getting Mags killed off?"

Katniss' tension ruffles the air around her, and my own body reacts with a sense of springing alertness. I know she knows this, but I still want to shout her the warning - _do not_ give Johanna the excuse to break this fragile alliance, not here and now.

"Go ahead," snarls Johanna, and I can't honestly tell if she's baiting her or is genuinely upset. "Try it. I don't care if you are knocked up, I'll rip your throat out," snarls Johanna.

"Maybe we all had better be careful where we step," says Finnick, smoothly, and his voice is both authoritative and calming. He takes the coil from Johanna and sets it on Beetee's chest. "There's your wire, Volts. Watch where you plug it."

Katniss takes a deep breath - and the moment passes. Everything in me tingles in relief - that was a little too much like the Career squabbling early on in the last Games.

I pick up Beetee, who clutches the wire. The extra rest has helped. I feel strong and fairly normal, except for the sore in my leg at the prosthesis. "Where to?"

"I'd like to go to the cornucopia," says Finnick. "And watch. Just to make sure we're right about the clock."

Katniss nods, but she has a troubled look. Despite the help that Finnick has been - and it's been enormous - she looks anxious about following his lead. At any moment, he could walk us into a trap - and the bickering on the beach must stand as a reminder that, at the end of the day, the Career alliance is always designed to break. But somehow, I don't think that Finnick will turn on us, yet. Not with the _other_ Career alliance still intact.

We go over to the nearest sand spoke and walk down it to the Cornucopia. We're approaching it a little from the side, so we are careful when edging around to the opening, in case anyone has concealed themselves there. I put Beetee down in the shade and prop him against the horn, then I look around anxiously. Just like last year, although we have the numbers, being exposed in the center of the arena suddenly feels all kinds of vulnerable.

Beetee calls Wiress over and asks her to wash off the coil. She goes over to the water's edge and starts dunking it. She starts singing a quiet little song, at least for a minute. After a while, she stands up and points back down the way we came. "Two," she says.

Katniss shades her eyes to look down to the jungle. "Yes, look. Wiress is right. It's two o'clock and the fog has started."

We look and we, too, can see it, seeping out of the trees. "Like clockwork," I say. "You were very smart to figure that out, Wiress."

Wiress starts up her song again, and sits down to continue cleaning the wire. "Oh, she's more than smart, she's intuitive," says Beetee. "She can sense things before anyone else. Like a canary in one of your coal mines."

"What's that?" asks Finnick.

Katniss frowns. "It's a bird that we take down into the mines to warn us if there's bad air.

"What's it do - die?" asks Johanna.

"It stops singing first. That's when you should get out. But if the air's too bad, it dies, yes. And so do you."

I'm jolted back in time - to school, and our annual field trips down into the mines. I always felt sorry for those little yellow birds, lowered into the darkness. Especially since their warnings often come too late. If the miners hit a pocket of dangerous gas, the canary's death is usually only seconds before it is too late for them.

I shake off the image and concentrate on something else. I pull out the leaf I brought and spread it out on the ground. Using the tip of one of my smaller knives, I gently draw a circle, with a small circle inside it and twelve spokes radiating out of the inner circle to the edge of the larger one. Katniss comes over - she's gathered more arrows and is finding room for them in her quiver - and leans over me. "Look how the cornucopia's positioned," I point out.

"The tail points toward twelve," she says.

"Right, so this is the top of our clock," I say, scratching the numbers next to the spokes. "Twelve to one is the lightning zone." I label the wedge, then follow it up with the labels _blood_ , _fog_ and _monkeys_ in the succeeding wedges.

"And ten to eleven is the wave," she reminds me, so I add this, too. "Did you notice anything unusual in the others?" she asks Johanna and Beetee. They shake their heads. "I guess they could hold anything."

"I'm going to mark the ones where we know the Gamemakers' weapon follows us out past the jungle, so we'll stay clear of those," I say, drawing lines through the fog and wave wedges. "Well - it's more than we knew this morning."

We're all silent for a moment, wondering what to do next - and just in time, a second before it is too late, we realize what the silence means. Katniss is fitting an arrow to her bow before she even turns toward where Wiress is. _Was_. Wiress is in Gloss' arms, her throat cut by the knife dripping in his hand. And then, there is an arrow in his skull and he falls back into the water. Johanna throws an axe at Cashmere and it finds its mark. The cannon sounds three times.

Brutus and Enobaria appear from the other side of the Cornucopia, and Brutus throws the spear toward me as I am still struggling to my feet. Finnick throws himself in front of it and knocks the spear away with his trident. He gets Enobaria's knife in his thigh and I jump up to make sure he's all right, just barely aware that Katniss and Johanna have leapt up to follow them as they dive back behind the Cornucopia. Then the island starts to spin.

I thrust my knife deep into the sand as the spinning increases in speed, and hold on to the hilt to keep myself from being sucked out over the side. Finnick slips past me and I grab his arm and cling to it, dizzily. The jungle circling us is just a blur of green. And then, as suddenly as we began, we stop.

"Katniss!" I stumble to my feet - I have to steady myself a second until my vision stops spinning - and run over to the other side of the cornucopia, where Katniss and Johanna are getting up, dizzy but unharmed.

"Where's Volts?" asks Johanna.

"There!" Finnick, hobbling over to join us, points out into the water. "I'll get him," he says, and unhesitatingly dives into the lake.

"Wiress!" chokes Katniss. She runs over to the water's edge and looks around for Wiress' body. "The wire," she explains to me. "Cover me." She throws her weapons to the ground and dives into the water, where Wiress' body has floated away in the wake of the spinning island. I pick up the bow and arrow - although, in terms of "covering" her, there's not much I can do there. Johanna and I just watch helplessly as she knifes through the water.

"Where'd your girlfriend learn to swim?" asks Johanna. I just shrug. It's a good question - though, I'm really not surprised. What Katniss doesn't know about surviving in nature - I have yet to find out.

The hovercraft appears just as Katniss reaches Wiress' body. We watch her wrench the coil out of the woman's final grip as first Gloss, then Cashmere, are lifted out of the arena. Then, Katniss swims away and the hovercraft claw descends for Wiress. The five of us gather again at the cornucopia, breathing hard - as much with the rapidity of the recent events as the labor. Beetee takes the coil from Katniss and, now that it has been washed clean of the blood that coated it, we see that it is a very fine gold wire, not much thicker than hair.

Katniss looks from Beetee to Johanna and then Finnick, and at last she looks at me. I give her a small smile and she comes over and wraps her arms around me.

"Let's get off this stinking island," says Johanna, but it's without her usual venom. There was something fragile about Wiress that makes her death every bit as somber as Mags'. Everyone collects their weapons, and Finnick strips off his undershirt to wrap around the wound in his thigh. Katniss helps Beetee to his feet and he confirms that he can walk now.

"Let's head to the twelve o'clock beach," Katniss says. "That gives us a lot of hours without traps, and nothing leeching out onto that beach."

We all agree, and then Finnick, Johanna and I each turn toward a different spoke.

"Twelve o'clock, right?" I say. "The tail points at twelve."

"Before they spun us," argues Finnick. "I was judging by the sun."

"The sun only tells you it's going on four, Finnick," Katniss points out.

Finnick and I squint at her, and then Beetee says, "I think Katniss' point is, knowing the time doesn't necessarily mean knowing where four is on the clock. You might have a general idea of the direction. Unless you consider that they may have shifted the outer ring of jungle, as well."

Looking around, it's unfortunately true. There's a depressing uniformity to the jungle, too, that I didn't notice before. The twelve o'clock wedge had a tall tree in the middle of the wedge, but there is a similarly tall tree in each section.

"Yes," says Katniss. "So, any one of these paths could lead to twelve o'clock."

"Should we follow Brutus and Enobaria's tracks?" asks Johanna.

"They were washed or swept away when the land was spun," says Finnick.

"I should have never mentioned the clock," Katniss says. "Now they've taken that advantage away as well."

"Only temporarily," Beetee reassures her. "At ten, we'll see the wave again and be back on track."

"Yes, they can't redesign the whole arena," I add, thinking, hopefully we've figured out where the ten o'clock wedge is by then. But I smile encouragingly at Katniss. (Who will turn first? I wonder fretfully. Finnick or Johanna? Will they act in concert? Who will they target first - me or Katniss? Where does that leave Beetee in the mix?)

"It doesn't matter," Johanna breaks through my thoughts. "You had to tell us or we never would have moved our camp in the first place, brainless." Katniss actually smiles at this. "Come on, I need water. Anyone have a good gut feeling?"

We end up following one of the spokes near the tail, after all. We cautiously walk up the beach to peer curiously in the jungle, looking for any sign of an active trap.

"Well," I say. "It must be monkey hour and I don't see any of them in there. I'm going to try to tap a tree."

"No, it's my turn," says Finnick.

A shiver crawls down my spine. What is this? At no point have we been taking turns. "I'll at least watch your back," I say, slowly.

"Katniss can do that," says Johanna. "We need you to make another map. The other washed away." She pulls a leaf off of a tree and as she does, I look over at Katniss, whose suspicions are clear in her lowered eyebrows. But, she looks over at me and just shrugs.

The leaf Johanna picked is smaller than one I used earlier, but I just draw the circles in again, my thoughts preoccupied. It's become something of a pattern, I think. Finnick approaching Katniss at the tribute parade and in the training center. Johanna also approaching me in both places. Now they both seem to be trying to keep Katniss and me within their individual sights - and to be working in collusion, no less. If they are still working on Haymitch's instructions, perhaps they are just trying to put off the moment Katniss inevitably decides to split off from this alliance. But it's clumsily done. And whatever Haymitch's intentions, it's not possible that Finnick and Johanna - who have an understanding of some kind, that much at least is clear - will retain the alliance until the very end. It might be too early - although, maybe not. We've halved the Career pack. There are now just four other tributes out there - Brutus, Enobaria, Chaff and - one other person, whom I can't even recall. It would make a certain sense to eliminate us now, before we're expecting it, and - now that they know a good portion of how the jungle works, take their chances, jointly, on the rest.

It occurs to me that, hunched on the ground, my knife preoccupied, I'm not in the most defensible position. And just as I straighten, there is a scream from within the jungle.

"Katniss!"


	23. Chapter 23

**Chapter Twenty-Three**

* * *

"Prim?" I say in confusion. For that is the voice I'm almost certain I've heard.

"Prim!" shrieks Katniss, from within the trees. Then I realize. This is another trap.

"Katniss, no!" This is Finnick.

"Oh, shit," I say, leaping toward the jungle.

Katniss' shrieks recede further into the trees. "Prim! Prim!"

"Katniss, no!" I pant. Johanna catches up with me, and then overtakes me as I stumble over the vines. Then, abruptly, she stops and falls back, knocking me underneath her.

"Shit!" says Johanna, rubbing her elbow.

I extricate myself from her and start forward.

"Watch it!"

Then I hit it, too, the invisible wall. It's not a force field - just a solid and completely invisible barrier in front of us. I can feel it under my fingers - there's no give to it; I might be touching a window, but an impenetrable one. I feel along it - down one side, and then another. Finally, I try bashing it with my knife, both with the blunt hilt and the sharp blade.

"You know that's not going to work," says Johanna wearily.

My heart is pounding. Where is she? Where is Finnick? Where was she lured, with her sister's screams?

Beetee comes walking up behind us. He touches the barrier and says, "Well, that's an impressive feat of engineering."

"How do we get through it?" I snap at him.

"Probably when the hour is up," he says.

"So, I guess we found the four o'clock wedge," says Johanna.

"Lucky us," I say, angrily. If I had gone with Finnick, as I should have _insisted_ \- what would they have used to lure me into the jungle? The only person I fear - really fear - being torn from me is Katniss, and she's already here. But for Katniss - this has hit her in one of her few vulnerable spots. I grind my teeth - I've been useless to her so far. Honestly, useless.

"There they are," says Beetee, and my heart jumps.

We see them now, racing toward us. They are covering their ears as if what they hear could destroy their minds. We can't hear anything - the barrier cuts off sound, as well. I hold my palm up, shaking my head, _no, no, no._ Willing them to stop. But they both hit the wall, Finnick face first. I look at nothing but Katniss, whose face is twisted in terror. She pounds against the barrier and I show her - how the knife won't go through it. Johanna even tries hitting it with her axe. Finally, Katniss understands that she will be trapped there until the end of the hour, and the realization dawning on her face rips my heart out. I put my hand on the glass, and she puts her hand up to meet it on the other side.

"Katniss, Katniss, keep looking at me," I say, although I know she can't hear me. "It will be OK. This isn't real. It'll be over soon."

Finnick curls up in a ball, his fingers stuck in his ears. Katniss suddenly looks behind her, and then I see it, too - a flock of birds has settled into trees above her.

"Jabberjays," says Beetee.

Oh. The muttation. I squint at the trees to get a look at it - the bird that was twisted into a spy by the Capitol to listen to and repeat rebel plans. Then discarded when the rebels caught on and used the jabberjay, in turn, against the Capitol. I have nightmares about the mutts, yes - jackers and wolves, of course, the creatures that injured me in the first arena. Yet - I have some measure of pity for them, now, and of fellow feeling; I, too, am not what I once was. These birds an object of additional curiosity, _this_ bird - a link between the old rebellion and the new one, through its unintended progeny, the mockingjay. I finally appreciate the poetry, the symmetry of it, and I fully understand, I think, why Katniss is the one who ...

Katniss, who, at this moment, turns abruptly around and starts shooting the birds with her arrows -1, 2, 3, 4 - as quickly and seamlessly as she did in the training center. Pragmatic and competent, and ever so much more than a symbol. And I need to get a grip on myself. I will never see the ending of this tale - will never know if Katniss is the catalyst to end the oppression, or just the next stage in a series of stages of resistance. I am only here to see that she gets to the end of this arena. That's it. And I haven't really been doing my job, so far.

The birds drop around her until every arrow is spent, but more come and, eventually, she gives up on this exercise and mimics Finnick's fetal crouch, stopping her ears with her fingers. She will need comfort and reassurance when this hour is over. One thing I can do. One thing at a time.

Johanna and Beetee murmur softly behind me - something to be wary of. Finnick saved my life the first day of the arena and again at the cornucopia. And Johanna follows Finnick. What on earth can be their strategy here?

Now - together, they would be hard to beat, if it was just me or just Katniss. I think, strength for strength, I match either of them - this was not the case last year, between me and Cato, but I'm actually better matched to Finnick. He's quick and nimble with his weapon, but I would have a chance. Johanna is very much the same. But - two on one and I probably don't survive that confrontation. Katniss, however, has a very different set of skills. If she gets the chance to hide - to climb a tree and lie in wait - she could take them both down easily - 1, 2. So … I probably _would_ be the one that they would attempt to keep alive longer.

The question is - do they wait until after the Careers are gone to make their move on us? Can we take them - two on two? It is time to start seriously planning out the end game.

When the barrier disappears, I all but fall down on top of her. I pick her up and, though she is as light as ever, her rigid limbs make her hard to carry gracefully. But I take her out of the jungle and back to the beach. Sit down and adjust her on my lap. "Katniss, Katniss, it's OK, it's OK now. It's over now, it's OK."

I rock her back and forth, like a child, and barely notice the others return with Johanna leading a dazed-looking Finnick by the hand. Eventually, I can feel her muscles relax against me, and then she starts trembling.

"It's all right, Katniss."

"You didn't hear them," she chokes.

"I heard Prim. Right at the beginning. But it wasn't her. It was a jabberjay."

"It was her. Somewhere. The jabberjays recorded it."

I anticipated that she might come to this conclusion. "No, that's what they want you to think. The same way I wondered if Glimmer's eyes were in that mutt last year. But those weren't Glimmer's eyes. And that wasn't Prim's voice. Or - if it was, they took it from an interview or something and distorted the sound. Made it say whatever she was saying."

"No, they were torturing her. She's probably dead."

"Katniss, Prim isn't dead. How could they kill Prim? We're almost down to the final eight. What happens then?"

"Seven more of us die," she says flatly.

I close my eyes and kiss the top of her head. "No, back home. What happens when they reach the final eight tributes in the Games?" I lift her chin and force her to look into my eyes. "What happens? At the final eight?"

"At the final eight?" she swallows. "They interview your family and friends back home."

"That's right. They interview your family and friends. And can they do that if they've killed them all?"

"No?" she responds, uncertainly.

"No. That's how we know Prim's safe. She'll be the first one they interview, won't she?" It's a thin sort of logic, I know, but it's all I have. Katniss' uncertain look starts to show glimmers of hope, but she is clearly wavering. "First Prim. Then your mother. Your - cousin, Gale. Madge. It was a trick, Katniss. A horrible one. But we're the only ones who can be hurt by it. We're the ones in the Games. Not them."

I feel her body relaxing into mine, the trembling fading away. "You really believe that?"

"I really do," I say, smiling in assurance as I bend down to kiss her nose.

She looks over at Finnick, who I see now is staring at me in rapt attention. "Do you believe it, Finnick?"

"It could be true," he says uncertainly. "I don't know. Could they do that, Beetee? Take someone's regular voice and make it …"

"Oh, yes. It's not even that difficult, Finnick. Our children learn a similar technique in school."

Johanna snorts. "Of course Peeta's right. The whole country adores Katniss' little sister. If they really killed her like this, they'd probably have an uprising on their hands." At the word 'uprising,' the rest of us stare up at her with dropped jaws. "Don't want that, do they?" she shouts up to the sky. "Whole country in rebellion? Wouldn't want anything like that!"

I imagine the scrambling going on in the Gamemakers' editing room. Surely, as the alternative "career pack," featuring both the girl on fire and the sex symbol of Panem, we must be on camera nearly all the time. I think back to the years I was in the audience - watching on TV (which seems like an inordinately long time ago). There were always quick cuts between tributes, sometimes shots of the arena and replays of exciting moments that had already happened. I wonder how many times those long lost tributes had done or said something - like this - some last, frustrated sound of defiance - that we never saw. Suddenly, I have to believe it is true. I have to believe that some spark of defiance has always existed among the districts. Even if they were throwing sparks into emptiness, I need them to be with me now, the ghosts of their yells of rage carrying me on to the final sacrifice - and this time, there really are uprisings. There really could be a rebellion.

Johanna just shrugs. "I'm getting water," she says, picking up the shells.

"Don't go in there," pleads Katniss, irrationally. "The birds -."

"They can't hurt me," says Johanna coolly. "I'm not like the rest of you. There's no one left that I love."

Johanna brings Katniss water and then goes back into the jungle to collect her arrows. I watch her retreat into the trees and the horrible dilemma of the Games settles down on me. There's no way - no _way_ \- I can stick around and watch her die here - let alone be the one to kill her. Same with Finnick, really. And Beetee. This is just horrible. It's exactly like last year, when I kept putting off the moment of betrayal, the moment of confrontation with the Careers - there was always a reason to wait, while my plans constantly shifted. I need Katniss to survive, but I can't pile tributes around her in order to make it happen. If I was Gale … maybe even if I was Haymitch - maybe - I would turn on all of them, now. Three more down, four to go. We'd have the jungle on our side to help pick off the rest. And then suicide would be fucking easy. My options are numerous - drown in the lake, stick my knife in the force field, walk back into the poisonous fog. But I'm simply incapable of doing it.

 _Remember who the enemy is._ That was Haymitch - to _Katniss_. I'm the enemy. I'm the one for whom she clings to this allegiance to the point where it's getting painful. To the point where it's getting dangerous. She hasn't even let me take a watch yet, as if it couldn't possibly matter how much sleep she gets, as long as I get as much as I possibly can. And why is this? Because she is still determined that I will be the one to leave the arena, and apparently either Haymitch didn't convince her - or he actually sided with her.

I internally shake myself. No. No. Haymitch may have been free to play his games last time, but the stakes are too high now. It's deliberate and I know this - Cinna's dress, transforming Katniss into the living symbol of the mockingjay. They are pushing her as the inspiration to the districts on the verge of rebellion. Perhaps it was accidental the first time. After all, we were twinned at the beginning. But it was Katniss who caught everyone's imagination, including my own. She must be the one to go on. And this has to do with so much more than my personal need to keep her alive.

Why, I wonder, would she think that Haymitch would choose me? She has been very reluctant to take on the mantle of rebel leader, that's for one thing. First, she agreed to mute the impact of the outcome of the last Games by doubling down on her affectionate manner toward me. And again, during the Tour. Then, when this failed, she wanted us to flee. It was when Gale refused to leave - and was immediately punished - that she changed her mind. But this was brief. From the time of the Quarter Quell announcement, she has thrown herself into the Games, and I've only been able to fool myself for brief moments that it was in order to win again. I have known - somehow, I'm not sure, exactly, except that I do - from the beginning that she intends me to win. Never mind what she has told Haymitch. What has she told herself? To justify this course of action?

She stirs in my arms, huddles against me as if she would burrow into me if she could. I bury my thoughts, because she has been so adept at reading my mind, lately. "Who did they use against Finnick?" I ask, looking at him as he takes to the water.

"Somebody named Annie."

"Must be Annie Cresta," I say.

"Who?"

"Annie Cresta. She was the girl Mags volunteered for. She won about five years ago."

"I don't remember those Games much. Was that the earthquake year?"

I realize - that was the summer after her father died. The summer after I threw her the bread. When we rewatched all the games this spring, I skimmed over this one, remembering it well and knowing how little good information we could get from it. "Yeah. Annie's the one who went mad when her district partner got beheaded. Ran off by herself and hid. But an earthquake broke a dam and most of the arena got flooded. She won because she was the best swimmer."

"Did she get better after? I mean - her mind?"

"I don't know. I don't remember ever seeing her at the Games again. But she didn't look too stable during the reaping this year."

Katniss bites her lip and glances over at Finnick, looking unhappier than ever.

There's a cannon blast, and we jump up. Despite everything I just berated myself about, I'm relieved that Johanna comes out of the jungle, fists full of arrows, still alive. A hovercraft appears just a few sections of the clock away from us and the claw goes down five times to retrieve the bloodied pieces of a single body.

"What would you say that is - six o'clock?" I ask, thinly, bending down to retrieve my leaf map. I draw the labels for _jabberjays_ at four and, after some consideration, _beast_ at six.

"Well," says Finnick, still pale but looking more like himself. "If there was a benefit to the jabberjay attack - we didn't lose anyone, we know where we are on the clock again, and we now know - what? - seven of the twelve hours on the clock."

And then, as evening falls, we all settle in as if we were on a camping trip. Beetee plays with his wire. Finnick pulls grass and vines and starts weaving baskets and nets. Johanna sits apart from us, buries her feet in the sand and watches the sun melt into the water. Katniss goes into the water and splashes around; emerging dripping wet and half-smiling, she comes over to sit next to me, unbraid her hair, and put more ointment on. I watch her - try not to notice the way her damp shirt clings to her skin.

Finnick dives deeper, with his freshly-made net, and after disappearing for a while, emerges with a pretty good haul of shellfish. The moon is rising as he empties the contents of the net into his new baskets. As we eat, the anthem begins, and we watch the sky. After everything that has already happened, it's hard to believe that this is only our second night in the arena. The rest of these Games might be measured in mere hours, not days.

Cashmere and Gloss. Wiress and Mags. The female tribute from 5. The morphling. Blight. The male from 10. Eight more dead - sixteen total. Eight left.

"Who's left?" asks Finnick quietly. "Besides us five and District 2?"

"Chaff," I say, heavily. I have to say, I was almost hoping to see his face, because I don't want to have to be involved in killing Haymitch's friend.

We're distracted by the descent of a parachute. As I have each time so far, I go to collect it. I find more bread - not a loaf this time, but a bag of small rolls. I sniff. Buttermilk, I think. I hold them out to Beetee. "These are from your district, right Beetee?"

He peers into the bag, without taking it, his expression difficult to translate. "Yes, from District 3. How many are there?"

Finnick pours them into a basket. He counts them in an odd way, turning them over in his hands, as if looking for some message written on them. "Twenty-four," he says.

"An even two dozen?" asks Beetee.

"Twenty-four on the nose. How should we divide them?"

Johanna laughs shortly. "Let's have three each and whoever is still alive at breakfast can take a vote on the rest."

Katniss returns the laugh and Johanna looks at her as if finally considering her an ally.

"It's almost ten," says Katniss, once we start talking about setting up tonight's watch. "Once the wave comes and goes, let's go to that beach. It will be free of traps for twelve hours, then we can set up two or three watches."

We do as she suggests, taking care to count the spokes in the darkness and watch the jungle warily. We have to walk half the circle to get there, and by the time we do, it is apparently after eleven and we can hear whatever is in that sector - a cacophony of clicking sounds, like large pincers. Whatever it is, we do not see anything come out of the trees, and we camp near the far end of the ten o'clock sector, well out of range of whatever waits in there.

"I want to take a watch tonight," I tell Katniss.

"Yes, you and me - first watch. I think we're the most rested."

I expect some objection from Johanna and Finnick, but they're both too tired to argue. Too trusting. Too secure in the knowledge that neither Katniss nor I will do what we need to do. Johanna goes to sleep immediately. Finnick not long after, though his sleep is restless. Beetee drifts off quietly.

Katniss and I sit side by side, hips together, but facing the opposite direction. She watches the water and the cornucopia, I watch the trees. After a few minutes of just listening to the clicking in the eleven o'clock sector, I feel her head rest on my shoulder. I put down my machete and touch her hair with my fingers, running them through the soft strands. And, as if I'm on stage again, and the light has come up, and Caesar is feeding me my cue, I know that it is time.

"Katniss. It's no use pretending we don't know what the other one is trying to do." She stiffens at first, then sighs, but doesn't speak. "I don't know what kind of deal you think you made with Haymitch, but you should know he made me promises, as well. So, I think we can assume he was lying to one of us."

At this, she raises her head and I turn mine to meet her eyes. In her expression, I can so clearly see Haymitch, and I don't know what he told her while she got drunk at his house that night, but surely, surely, I can reverse it.

"Why are you saying this now?" she asks.

I pause on the words. "Because I don't want you forgetting how different our circumstances are." I swallow, trying to forget the cameras, the audience that has been waiting - waiting - for this very moment. I need Katniss to know it is time to finally make the decision - her life or mine - and to argue my side irretrievably, even if I have to spell out the rebellion's need for her directly. So, I've decided to plow ahead as if there are no cameras, no audience. No fake marriage, no made-up baby. Just me and her - at the end, again. "If you die," I begin bluntly, "and I live - there's no life for me at all back in District 12. You're my _whole_ life. I would never be happy again." She opens her mouth to argue this, but I put my finger on her lips. "It's different for you. I'm not saying it wouldn't be hard. But there are other people who'd make your life worth living."

I pull the locket off and hold it out to her. The carved mockingjay on it is thrown into deep relief by the moonlight. Again I bless whatever spirit moved Effie to choose this particular piece of jewelry, which speaks so distinctly to the two audiences at once - Capitol and rebels. Just by holding it out to her, I pledge my allegiance to her both as my lover and my leader. But between us, just between her and I, will be the indicator that our allegiance is finally over - that I give her freely back to District 12 and give myself, finally, to death. I open the locket and show her the pictures Portia found for me. Still shots from interviews, I guess. Her mother and Prim, standing together in the kitchen of their new house, laughing. Gale, smiling. I've never really seen him before with happiness in his eyes, and I have to acknowledge that it shows off how very handsome he actually is.

Cousin. Husband. Brother-in-arms. It doesn't matter. Someone to go home to.

"Your family needs you," I tell her.

Her breathing increases, but she makes neither sound nor movement as she stares at the pictures. I try to read her thoughts through the lights playing on her eyes, but too many emotions are flitting across her face right now. She looks from the locket up to me and very slightly shakes her head. As always, she's just so very stubborn.

"No one really needs me," I conclude, matter-of-factly. It's hard to say it without self-pity in my voice, although I try my hardest. Because, in a very real way, no one actually does. Not like she is needed. I've seen how easily I am separated from my family and friends.

She surprises me with her quick, fierce look - almost angry. And it settles into that old expression - the set, determined look is on her again. So familiar to me from last year, when she was determined to keep herself closed off to me. But it doesn't mean the same thing today. "I do," she says, her voice both surprised and assured, as if she has just discovered something she always actually knew. " _I_ need you."

It is so damn easy for her to disarm me. I blink away sudden tears and take a deep breath, ready to start again. But she won't let me talk. And she won't let me think. She twists her body so that she is facing me and leans in to kiss me.

Something … different about this, I think, vaguely, as her moist lips press delicately against my own. I feel strangely vulnerable to this sensation - one I haven't felt since she kissed me in the cave of the first Games, and I thought it was for real. All those kisses since have not felt like this. Her mouth is warm and urgent.

"Katniss, I …" I start to say when we break apart, but she shakes her head. Under the half-faded mask of ointment, there is some new expression on her face. Brand new. And she leans in and kisses me again, this time tilting her head so that she can suckle on my half-open mouth.

"Katniss," I breathe against her lips.

But that is the last thing I attempt to say. She takes my cheeks in her hands and draws me into her, and at last I submit to it. And why should I not? I have only a short time left to take whatever she is willing to give to me. As if I knew what I was doing - it doesn't matter, anyway, my body knows this by instinct - I part her lips with my tongue and meet hers, just beyond the ridge of her teeth. As we start to lose balance, I put my arms around her, and my fingers grip her lower back. And when she moans, faintly, I realize that _finally_ \- but far too late - what she feels for me is _real_ , and she knows it. In a hundred years, she would never kiss like this for show, just as she has never, even for the cameras, said _I love you_. She wants me. Every bit as much as I wanted her on those nights I lay next to her, watching the rise and fall of her breasts in her sleep. When she danced with me, her hips bumping mine. When she licked her fingers after breakfast, hunger still in her eyes.

This time, as desire courses through me, hot and insistent, I don't force it down. I run my hands up the gentle curve of her back and into her hair – her loose, soft, damp, beautiful hair. I pull her closer into me and taste and taste the warm honey of her mouth. I know – instinctively – what should come next. Where my mouth should go next. Where my body is supposed to go. And we are seconds away from the Capitol having to cut away from us for a very different reason than before …when the lightning strikes, signaling midnight, and the twelve chimes begin.

We break apart, startled. Then, I look at her and smile – I think I smile, maybe I just gape at her in awe; it's hard to tell. She doesn't return the smile at first; she looks - somewhat bemused. I wait, as if for her to answer my unspoken question. And then she smiles back. She touches my lips with her fingertip as if, despite her long familiarity with them, they are suddenly new and unexplored. I'm not sure what is about to happen - I'm at her mercy, utterly at her command; at this moment, I'd give her anything except for the one thing I know she wants to ask of me - but Finnick suddenly stirs and wakes with a cry, just as the last of the midnight chimes fades away.

He gives a couple of loud, deep breaths, then says, "I can't sleep anymore. One of you should rest." Then he stares at us, his cat-like eyes shining in the moonlight. "Or both of you," he adds, with a touch of sarcasm. "I can watch alone."

I shake my head and reluctantly pull myself out of Katniss' arms. I pick up the locket from where it fell into the sand between us, and help Katniss to her feet. "It's too dangerous. I'm not tired. You lie down, Katniss."

She mutely agrees and I lead her over to where Beetee and Johanna are sleeping and turn to her with a smile. I close the locket and put it around her neck. Then - to remind her of the future that she still could have: the one thing I hope my kisses have persuaded her to embrace - I put a hand on her stomach, cupping it gently as if my baby was really there. "You're going to make a great mother, you know." She still hasn't spoken - not one word since she leaned in to kiss me. She's just staring at me. And I understand, now, what she has told herself. Why she has chosen me. This - finally this - is what it is means to be loved by Katniss Everdeen. It is to be protected with every inch of her life.

I give her one more kiss, a quick and distracted - a troubled - kiss.

I go over and join Finnick, but walk into the lake and sit in it up to my waist, letting the warm water swirl around my groin until the tension in it eases. Finnick keeps glancing over at me, and, as I let my elbows sink down into the sand, leaning back so I can look straight up at the night sky, trying not to grin, he coughs lightly.

"Feeling better?" he asks.

"Yes," I answer shortly, and, in fact, it's true. Mostly. When I first understood myself to be falling in love with Katniss, I remember the sort of light and giddy pain of it all. That was before the dire circumstances closed around us and the life-or-death stakes made everything so intense. So - it's strange to experience a return of that feeling, here and now. Like - in these very last hours of my life, I feel startlingly alive - my skin sizzling, as if waking out of a paralytic sleep. My heart thumping, as if pumped back to life after being stopped. In fact, for the first time since hitting the force field ... no, way before - way, way before that: for the first time since I was Reaped last year, I feel basically like myself again - and more so. It's like I've rediscovered the person I had come to believe didn't even really exist before the Games. The secret to becoming Peeta Mellark? Always - always - this girl was at the root of it.

"Except for one thing," I add. Throwing caution aside, I reach down and loosen the seal of my prosthetic, and gently ease it off. I let the water tickle the skin below my knee that hasn't felt air in over two days. I close my eyes and breathe in as much of the wet, sticky air that my lungs can tolerate. Vulnerable, unwary, unarmed, and deliciously alive. For a little while, at least.


	24. Chapter 24

**Chapter Twenty-Four**

* * *

I am very aware of the clock. It feels like the day itself is a kind of timer, a countdown to an urgent moment - a moment that I will not be able to relive if it passes.

"Stop hogging the crayons," says the little girl next to me.

"You don't even like drawing," I reply, stubbornly. I look down from the clock on the wall to the piece of paper under my fingers and see that the swirl of bright lines and shapes is very amateurly done. I can do better than this….

"I'm bored," she says.

"Fine." I push all the crayons toward the girl with yellow curls and I squint at her for a moment - how precisely she looks like the girl in my memories.

I am also - but more vaguely - aware that I have lived this day already, that this sense of anxiety is a false layer on top of the true story - that I am seeing things through a bright and distorted lens.

The clock makes that subtle sound - the soft click - at the change of the hours. I look up again, biting my mouth in my anxiety. An irrational fear floods me - that it won't happen this time. That if it doesn't happen, everything will change. Everything will be different.

Delly is spastically drawing - almost mockingly, it feels like, making chaotic balls of angrily-colored lines. It's as if it doesn't matter - as if color and form and sense and art don't even matter to her and she's trying to make sure that I know this is how she feels. Then, I notice that I missed some announcement. Everyone except for me is standing up, moving to another part of the room. I crane my neck - looking toward the window. The sun is shining directly into it so the window itself is a glowing square. The light trembles as she climbs in front of it - perching on top of the stool like a little bird.

I feel again - but more intensely, I think - the curiosity and fascination. In these last moments before the spell, I eagerly wonder if she inherited the magical voice of her father. From my strange perspective - both there in the moment and somehow here in my sleeping head, years later - I can sense, almost see, the fragile lines that connect us. The voice that lured her mother to the Seam - and so _I_ was born, of my father's second connection.

The clock is running out, I note fretfully. The school day is almost over and she is hesitating, silent. She's just a silhouette framed by a burst of sun.

" _Roses love sunshine, violets love dew-"_

And then I wake, abruptly, the bright pink sun in my eyes.

I start, surprised that I slept long enough to dream. Surprised that I'm still _alive_. Katniss is still sleeping, just next to me on the sand. Down the beach, Finnick is walking back and forth in the lake, ankle-deep in the water. Johanna is lying down with her hands behind her head. Beetee is uncoiling his wire and wrapping it loosely around his wrist.

I spent most of the night awake. When Johanna woke up, between us we managed to persuade Finnick to go back to sleep and I went up to sit next to Katniss. I was wary and wakeful almost the entire time - I remember spending the anxious hours rolling through every possible scenario given who is still alive and how they are armed, all the way until the sky under the dome started turning pale at the edges.

So, I haven't slept long, but I have slept. Very foolish. Yet - the alliance still stands.

I look down at the sleeping girl next to me and I just enjoy, for a moment, the peaceful lines of her face in sleep. This reminds me of our time in the cave. My death was imminent then, as well - yet, it didn't end up happening. What if -?

No. I shake off the temptation to go down that path. I came to many decisions last night, and one major realization. I will, in fact, have to kill Finnick. And Johanna. And even Beetee. It is important that Katniss make it to the end of the Game - but also, it is important to bolster her for what comes after. The Capitol wants to soil her hands with the deaths of some of their most popular Victors - including mine. She must have no more blood on her hands. For her - for the rebellion - I will have to strike those blows, as many as I can.

So, I don't go down immediately to join the others. I'm hesitant to leave Katniss' side. But, also, I can't join them, yet, until I have subsumed my horror of the Game and can keep it out of my face. It's twenty minutes or so before I get up, stretch, duck into the trees to pee, then walk down the beach to greet the others.

"Get some rest?" asks Finnick, not looking at me, but staring intently at the Cornucopia.

"Yes," I reply, shortly. He doesn't get any non-essential information from me. "What's Beetee up to?" I add.

Finnick shakes his head. "It's always hard to tell. He said something about setting a trap for the Careers."

"That should probably be the next move," I agree vaguely. But it also worries me. Something about time … running out of time. When the Careers are gone, the countdown to the end will begin. The break - the sudden change. Allies transformed in the blink of an eye into enemies. The mutation. The moment … the moment.

I shake my head and put some paces between me and Finnick before bending down to wash my hands in the salty water.

I look up as something flashes in the corner of my eye - my heart automatically racing. But it's just another parachute. We _are_ popular. There's no arguing the fact that to be in this alliance has had its perks.

"One more time?" Finnick asks me with a wry look.

Well, why not, I suppose. I go to pick up the parachute, and under the silver canvas folds I find another tin of rolls from District 3. I wonder in amusement if the District 3 bakery is experiencing some kind of overstock of ingredients. Although, that's silly, I remind myself, as Finnick and I walk back up towards Johanna and Beetee. Gifts in the arena are extremely expensive - it would be cheaper to ….

I see that Katniss is up and stretching and I smile at her. I hand Beetee the tin and he counts out the biscuits again as he places them, one by one, in one of Finnick's baskets. We have again been sent two dozen of the things. Which is … fine. Some variety might be nice, I think, ungratefully.

Katniss sits down next to me to eat, and the touch of her hip against mine forces the memories from last night to the forefront of my mind. I glance down at her and she catches my eye, then blushes and looks away. After we eat, though, she takes my hand and pulls me toward the lake.

"Come on. I'll teach you how to swim."

I raise my eyebrows, but follow her. "First thing," she says, matter-of-factly, "you have to understand that you float, and to not be afraid of sinking."

"Well, I have the flotation belt, yes," I say, pointing to the plastic purple belt that is wrapped around my waist, but she's not really paying attention. She's alert to everything else.

"Second, you have to remember to breathe." She glances toward the beach. "So, you are going to float on your stomach first. But I'll support you."

She puts her hands on my belly as I lay down face forward and reluctantly kick my feet out from under me. She demonstrates the stroke, then tells me to practice coordinating my hands and feet. I don't know if it's the prosthetic, or if I'm just clumsy, but I find this coordination nearly impossible, and more often than not, after flailing about, I end up letting the purple belt hold me up while I dip my face in the water and kick around a bit. But it doesn't seem to matter what I'm doing. Every time I look over at Katniss, she's either scrubbing her arms or glancing back at the beach.

"Hey," she says. "Come here a sec. I think the scabs are coming off."

I obediently paddle back over to her and see that she's right. She's scrubbed both her arms with sand and the skin underneath is smooth and new. I follow her lead. As we're doing this, she edges up to me and says, in a soft voice, "Look, the pool is down to eight. I think it's time we took off."

I nod, trying to keep my face blank. I understand this impulse. I walked down that path dozens of times last night - looking for the way that abandoning this allegiance now would be beneficial to us. If we weren't specifically targeted - not just by the Careers, but the Gamemakers themselves … but there is no getting around the fact that we are. "Tell you what. Let's stick around until Brutus and Enobaria are dead. I think Beetee's trying to put together some kind of trap for them now. Then, I promise, we'll go."

At which point, I will have to attack and she will have to run.

She purses her mouth thoughtfully and I watch an inner conflict take place behind her eyes. "All right," she says. "We'll stay until the Careers are dead. But that's the end of it." She turns toward the beach and calls Finnick over to tell him how to scrub off his scabs.

Once we've finished scrubbing ourselves clean, we go back up to the beach and Katniss makes us apply more ointment, as it seems to be good protection from the glaring sun. "Where'd you learn how to swim, Katniss?" I ask her.

She parts her lips and hesitates - thinking about the cameras, no doubt - but eventually says, "There's a lake. It's some distance east of … the Meadow. My father used to take me there, and he taught me."

"Oh."

She looks at me thoughtfully. I try not to wonder if she used to go there with Gale. She's about to say something else, but Beetee calls us over to him. He's sitting in the shade at the ridge of the trees, clutching his cylinder of fine wire.

"I have a plan. I think we all agree our next job is to kill Brutus and Enobaria," he says, and I wince at the pragmatism of his words. "I doubt they'll attack us openly again, now that they're so outnumbered. We could track them down, I suppose, but it's dangerous, exhausting work."

"Do you think they've figured out about the clock?" asks Katniss.

"If they haven't, they'll figure it out soon enough. Perhaps not as specifically as we have. But they must know that at least some of the zones are wired for attacks and that they're reoccurring in a circular fashion. Also, the fact that our last fight was cut off by Gamemaker intervention will not have gone unnoticed by them. We know it was an attempt to disorient us, but they must be asking themselves why it was done, and this, too, may lead them to the realization that the arena's a clock. So I think our best bet will be setting our own trap."

"Wait, let me get Johanna up," says Finnick. "She'll be rabid if she thinks she missed something this important."

"Or not," Katniss mutters, under her breath, and I smile.

When Finnick and Johanna rejoin us, Beetee makes us sit a little back while he draws in the sand: a circle, divided into twelve sections. "If you were Brutus and Enobaria," he says, "knowing what you know about the jungle, where would you feel safest?"

"Where we are now," I reply. "On the beach. It's the safest place."

"So, why aren't they on the beach?"

"Because we're here," says Johanna shortly.

"Exactly. We're here, claiming the beach. Now where would you go?"

"I'd hide just at the edge of the jungle," says Katniss. "So I could escape if an attack came. And so I could spy on us."

"Also to eat," adds Finnick. "The jungle's full of strange creatures and plants. But by watching us, I'd know the seafood's safe."

Beetee smiles. "Yes, good. You do see. Now here's what I propose: a twelve o'clock strike. What happens exactly at noon and at midnight?"

"The lightning bolt hits the tree," says Katniss.

"Yes. So what I'm suggesting is that after the bolt hits at noon, but before it hits at midnight, we run my wire from that tree all the way down into the saltwater, which is, of course, highly conductive. When the bolt strikes, the electricity will travel down the wire and into not only the water but also the surrounding beach, which will still be damp from the ten o'clock wave. Anyone in contact with those surfaces at that moment will be electrocuted."

In the silence that follows, you can almost hear the four of us trying to grasp Beetee's plan. My knowledge of how electricity works is rudimentary, at best. "Will that wire really be able to conduct that much power, Beetee?" I ask him. "It looks so fragile, like it would just burn up."

Beetee strokes the strands of ultrafine gold wire. "Oh, it will. But not until the current has passed through it. It will act something like a fuse, in fact. Except the electricity will travel along it." He looks at Katniss and I as if we will understand this, but it still doesn't really make sense to me.

"How do you know?" asks Johanna, skeptically.

"Because I invented it," says Beetee. "It's not actually wire in the usual sense. Nor is the lightning natural lightning, nor the tree a real tree. You know trees better than any of us, Johanna. It would be destroyed by now, wouldn't it?"

"Yes."

"Don't worry about the wire - it will do just what I say," says Beetee confidently.

Weird that the wire ended up in the Cornucopia, I think, alarm bells starting to jingle in my head. Although - so did bows and tridents. Still, this is something slightly more specialized.

"And where will we be when this happens?" asks Finnick.

"Far enough up in the jungle to be safe."

"The Careers will be safe, too, then, unless they're in the vicinity of the water," says Katniss.

"That's right."

"But all the seafood will be cooked," I say.

"Probably more than cooked. We will most likely be eliminating that as a food source for good. But you found other edible things in the jungle, right, Katniss?"

"Yes. Nuts and rats. And we have sponsors."

"Well, then, I don't see that as a problem. But as we are allies and this will require all our efforts, the decision of whether or not to attempt it is up to you four."

So - we hopefully electrocute the Careers (and Chaff), but really probably not, unless they decide to go to the beach when they see us leave it. Which they might not if they also observe us laying wire and suspect a trap. And we possibly eliminate the seafood, which means returning to the jungle to eat. It seems like a long shot for a plan with such a marginal chance of success.

"Why not?" Katniss says. "If it fails, there's no harm done. If it works, there's a decent chance we'll kill them. And even if we don't and just kill the seafood, Brutus and Enobaria lose it as a food source, too."

I glance at her. There's no way to know if she is going along with it for show, or if she actually believes in the plan. She's always set a lot of store by Beetee. But, since I think it is best, anyway, to be in the jungle when the alliance breaks, and not on the wide open beach, I immediately back her up. "I say we try it. Katniss is right."

Finnick looks at Johanna, raising his eyebrows. She squints at him. "All right, it's better than hunting them down in the jungle, anyway. And," she adds, a touch of irony in her voice, "I doubt they'll figure out our plan, since we can barely understand it ourselves."

"I want to inspect the lightning tree before we rig it," says Beetee.

"We need to move, anyway," answers Katniss, stirring. "It's a little after nine, I think. We need to get off this beach."

We collect everything we want to take with us and walk two sectors over to the twelve o'clock beach. Then we head back into the jungle. Johanna leads, Finnick and I follow, taking turns carrying Beetee up the slope, and Katniss is in the rear, covering us with her arrows. Once the tall tree near the crest of the hill appears, Finnick stops. "Katniss should take the lead here. She can hear the force field."

"Hear it?" asks Beetee, who is perched on Finnick's back.

"Only with the ear the Capitol reconstructed," she mutters.

"Then by all means, let Katniss go first," says Beete, after a pause. "Force fields are nothing to play around with."

As we reach the tree and stop, though, Katniss makes us pause where we are while she collects some nuts and throws them toward the force field so she can figure out exactly where it is. "Just stay below the tree," she tells us.

I pause a minute to wipe the sweat from my face. I can feel the damp streak down my back and under my arms. For a minute, I think how I would give absolutely anything to be back in the blizzard of last March, stuck in my house while the snows howled outside my window.

Beetee starts examining the tree. Katniss eyes the rest of us standing around and says, "Finnick, you guard Beetee. Peeta, you can gather nuts, Johanna can take the spile and collect some water. I'll hunt."

While at my task, I surreptitiously watch Beetee as he uses the wire to measure the circumference of the tree, and occasionally stops to pick up fallen fronds or branches. When Katniss comes back with three rats, I join her just below the force field - we sit behind a line she draws in the dirt - and I roast nuts while she skins the rats, then she and I cook them.

Beetee comes over to where we sit, holding a piece of bark, which he tosses into the force field. When it bounces back, it is glowing blue-white, but otherwise undamaged. After a few minutes, it returns to normal and he picks it up thoughtfully. "Well, that explains a lot," he says.

Katniss looks over at me with an amused expression. At that moment, a clicking sound comes from the adjacent section - the eleven o'clock section - of the jungle. It's that insect-like pincer sound again, only much louder than last night. We decide it's time to clear out of here, anyway, with noon less than an hour away. We move over to the next section, where there is a tall tree at the crest of the hill, identical to the lightning tree. We eat the nuts and the tree-rat, and wait until the clicking sound starts fading away.

"Katniss," says Beetee, "can you climb this tree and watch the lightning strike? I want to know if there's anything we should know about the strike."

She shrugs and clambers up the tree. We wait in breathless silence for the strike; I can feel the hairs on the back of my neck stand up as the electricity crackles around us. Then the boom and flash - lighting up the jungle. Then Katniss rejoins us.

"It's a single bolt of lightning," she tells Beetee, with a shrug. "Very bright - even in the sunlight. It makes the whole tree glow - like that piece of bark."

Beetee nods.

We feel nervous about re-entering the lightning sector during the hour, so we go back down to the beach and walk along it all the way around and back to the ten o'clock beach. I suppose there are some nerves, some anxiety about what is planned for tonight, what is going to happen for the rest of this game - but Katniss slips her hand in mine and we walk together along the firm sand, and I actually relax and allow myself to feel the happiness. What happens when your life compresses down - down - from years, to days, to hours, to minutes - is that each small moment starts to become dense with the current emotion. I live a lifetime with her by my side in the arena, in just the time it takes to walk around the clock.

Time - something about time ….

When we return to the ten o'clock beach, Katniss sits down next to me while I nap. When I wake up, late in the afternoon, Johanna and Beetee are both sleeping, and Finnick is standing knee-deep in the lake, staring out over the water as if trying to see the world on the other side of the arena. When he sees I'm awake, he calls us over.

"Would you guys like to help catch dinner?" he asks. Then he sets Katniss to dive for oysters and me to look for the bubbles in the sand that indicate buried shellfish. He wades in deeper and starts thrusting the trident into the water.

When we are finished, having caught basketfuls of oysters, mussels, crab and some larger fish from deep in the lake, we find Johanna and Beetee up and waiting for us. Johanna keeps watch while we clean and shell the fish. I've just pried open my fifth or sixth oyster when I see it. At first I think it's a bad oyster - and then it almost rolls right out of my hands. It's a small pearl, smooth and dark - silvery-gray, almost the exact color of her eyes. I gasp, then give a laugh. "Hey, look at this!" I hold up my palm. "You know," I say to Finnick, "if you put enough pressure on coal it turns to pearls."

"No it doesn't," says Finnick, but Katniss bursts into laughter. She remembers every bit as clearly as I do the earnest words of Effie Trinket, who used them to try to sell us to sponsors, when we were sparkling new tributes from District 12.

I pour some water on it and rub it against my tee-shirt. This will be the perfect gift to leave Katniss - its association with Effie diminishing any potential unwelcome weight to the gift. It can serve as a light memento of our times together in the Games. And anyway, it's just something pretty to give to her. I hold it out to her. "For you," I say, holding on to my amused grin.

She opens her hand up automatically to receive it, and for a while she lets it roll around on her palm, as she regards it with an unsure expression. Then she closes her hand around it and looks directly into my eyes. "Thanks," she says.

She holds my eyes and - as it went the day of the tribute parade - I suddenly feel abashed by my levity and aware just by her gaze that she is steeling herself for the sacrifice she plans to make for me. That she hesitates to accept the pearl not because it might be a burden to her, a token of my love that has always been a little more than she ever expected or asked for - but because she does not plan to be alive to keep it. Perhaps I hoped that maybe her kisses last night were an acceptance of my upcoming death, that they were a gift she was finally able to give me because _I_ would not be alive to complicate her future. Perhaps I managed to fool myself again. Now I understand she meant them as her goodbye. A cold feeling clutches me.

"The locket didn't work, did it?" In the silence, I feel Finnick stop whatever he's doing and stare at us. "Katniss?"

She touches the place under her tee-shirt where the locket is now. Her mockingjay pin flashes in the sunlight as her hand moves over it. "It worked," she says.

"But not the way I wanted it to." I bite my lip and look away, back to my pile of oysters.

I automatically return to cleaning and shelling the fish, but my mind is somewhere else. It's now clear that Katniss and I can't get to the end of this together, as there will be an impasse - or worse, a race to suicide between us. I'm not going to win any races against Katniss. The question is when. If Beetee is successful in killing the Careers, that means that she and I are going to run, anyway. But the arena is so small. How many enemies should I leave her before I let myself go? One. Preferably Beetee. But would she take the win over Beetee? She likes him. Johanna? A less sure outcome, but …

I shy away from these unpleasant scenarios - again - and glance up at the sky just as a parachute comes floating down. I sigh and walk over to pick it up - it is, once again, twenty-four rolls of District 3 bread. But also a small pot of red sauce.

"It's for the fish," says Finnick, smacking his lips.

Now, this is more like it. We divide the rolls up again and throw the fish into the pot, taking turns scooping it out with our fingers. Between the rolls and the fish, we are all stuffed well before the food is done. So we toss it all into the lake, rather than leave it behind for the Careers.

While I'm washing my hands and face, I glance down the beach at Katniss, who is doing the same. I watch her untie the vine from her belt and unfold the parachute that is on the other end of it. The spile and the skin ointment are in there. After rubbing it between her fingers for a moment, she adds the pearl to her items and closes the parachute and re-ties it to her belt. I take a deep breath and go over to her, and sit down. She settles in next to me, leans her head against my arm and takes my hand. I just sit and wonder if my final moment will come at my own hand or someone else's. If I will have time to say goodbye to her before I die.


	25. Chapter 25

**Chapter Twenty-Five**

* * *

The night-time bulletin from the Capitol shows us that no deaths have occurred today - quite an accomplishment, considering the reaping of the first two days. At what is judged to be nine, we head off of our beach and make for the twelve o'clock beach again. Beetee is finally recovered enough to walk on his own, but we are slow-going, nonetheless.

When we get to the tree, Finnick helps Beetee uncoil the wire and the rest of us stand guard. Every once in a while, I glance back to check their progress, but I have no idea what progress really looks like. There is a long strand of wire tied to a heavy branch and set aside on the ground. The rest of the spool is being passed back and forth between Beetee and Finnick as they wind it around the tree. Beetee's side of the tree is very precise, the wire set in uniform rows, with the angles between the rows reminding me of the wiring of a circuit board. This fills me with unexpected confidence in the plan, as surely Beetee is devising an efficient conduit for the energy. I follow the wire down to the branch and try to work that out - it might be like a ground wire? Is that even necessary in this case?

We hear the wave hit the beach just as Beetee announces that he is finished wiring the tree. He steps back for a minute to admire his work and Finnick scratches his head with a slight smile on his face. Then, Beetee turns around to us. "OK, what we need next is for Johanna and Katniss to take the coil back down to the lake, unwinding the wire as you go. Drop the spool into the lake - make sure it sinks. Then, run for the jungle."

Wait. Wait - wait - _wait_. "I want to go with them as a guard," I say.

"You're too slow," replies Beetee. "Besides, I'll need you on this end. Katniss will guard."

"But - ."

"There's no time to debate this. I'm sorry. If the girls are to get out of there alive, they need to move now." He hands the coil to Johanna.

Katniss looks at me with a panic on her face she is trying to cover. She glances at Beetee, at the tree. Then back to me. "It's OK," she tells me. "We'll just drop the coil and be right back up."

"Not into the lightning zone," says Beetee, his normally neutral voice tinged with urgency, now. "Head for the tree in the one-to-two o'clock sector. If you find you're running out of time, move over one more. Don't even think about going back on the beach, though, until I can assess the damage."

My breathing quickens and everything in my head races. If this _does_ work - if Beetee really is about to unleash something deadly enough to kill everything in the water … Or, if this is all a ruse (as the larger part of me can't help but think) - all about separating us into one-on-one battles …. Nothing - nothing about this is right. It's not right. We've reached the tipping point of the games and are making the wrong decision. We _made_ the wrong decision by not running away earlier, as she suggested. But how to object without breaking the alliance here and now? I shake my head as Katniss approaches me, and she gives me a reassuring smile. She takes my face in her hands. "Don't worry. I'll see you at midnight."

Then - she kisses me; its very gentleness is more powerful than the kisses of last night. Her hands are warm and damp on my warm, damp face, and again I feel that sensation of living an entire life in a moment - frozen in time. I feel her fingers on me, after she lets me go. And as the moment melts - disintegrates into the moist night - I understand that it is over. I have kissed her for the last time. I have, most likely, seen her for the last time. Now is the time for the alliance to end - we didn't break it; Beetee did - nonetheless - it is over now.

I watch her follow Johanna down the slope, walking behind her with the arrow fitted to her bow. Until there is no sign of her left but the fine golden wire, quivering in the moonlight. My mouth feels dry, and my breathing will not slow. I grip the handle of the machete and watch the wire tensely, but also try to keep attuned to any movement from the left side of me, where Finnick is standing, in silence. The pincer sound of the insects in the sector next to us has reached its frantic peak, adding to the sense of mayhem. When she is far enough away - too far for Johanna to hear what happens - I will move on Finnick - then Beetee.

Beetee says, calmly, "Don't worry, Peeta."

I swallow.

Just then, the regular quivering of the wire abruptly stops. The line goes slack and, seconds later, we hear a cry.

I jump forward. "Katniss!"

"Shit," says Finnick. He looks at Beetee. "The Careers. Be quiet - I'll be right back."

"I'm coming," I snarl.

He pushes me back. "Stay here, Peeta! She won't thank you for getting into the fray."

"Fuck you!" And I'm about to use the knife on him, when he knocks me down and springs away.

"Stay the fuck there, Peeta!" he shouts, as he disappears into the trees.

Cursing, I get to my feet.

"Peeta, no …" starts Beetee, but I follow Finnick into the trees.

I'm slithering down the slope as quickly as I can, when I'm confused by footsteps running toward me from the direction of the one o'clock sector. I squint into the darkness and a shadowy figure comes springing out of the trees. Chaff. He freezes when he sees me - and I just have time to register that he's weaponless, cut up, and much thinner than the last time I saw him. "Peeta," he says hoarsely. "Is it time?"

Time? The question is on my lips when there's another crash behind him. Brutus stumbles into sight as Chaff is turning around. Brutus has a sword, but Chaff rushes him, anyway, attempting to grip him in a bear hug before Brutus can strike. Brutus' blade hits, though. Chaff cries out, and I spring down to help him.

Weakened, but still struggling, Chaff clings to Brutus even as he is falling down, down to his death. It's enough to knock Brutus off of his feet, and they start sliding down the slope, me in pursuit.

 _Boom_!

The cannon sounds and I hesitate, not knowing if Chaff has already succumbed or if someone else has died. I can't escape the situation, though - locked into a combat with a Career. I reach them as Brutus has pushed Chaff off of him and he's struggling to pull up his sword when I get the first cut in. I have to get in close to use the machete. I slice his right arm - to the bone. I can feel the sickening click of it against the metal of my blade.

"Fuck," he snarls at me and grips the sword with his left. I parry his first, awkward blow, but he's very strong - I feel the give in my wrist even with his weakened strike - and I know I won't be able to outlast him in a blade-to-blade duel. But if I'm smaller, I'm also a lot younger - and quicker. And wrestling taught me to anticipate an opponent's moves. He makes a half-swivel to find his footing on the slope so he can swing at me harder - and I follow his turn, pull back the knife and stick it in his belly, just above the purple belt. His blood squirts on my face as he staggers toward me. I dance away from him, blessing my prosthetic foot for not failing, for once, to keep me balanced. The hot saliva is in my mouth and the metallic scent of blood is all around me, as I slice a gash across his throat. His sword drops to the ground. I draw back, expectantly. I'm waiting for the cannon - or for him to stir and come after me, but there's nothing, and in the silence, I remember.

"Katniss!" I scream into the night. "Katniss!"

There's no answer. I don't think I've missed a cannon. But I'm only assuming that Chaff is dead, yet. The cannon might have been for someone else.

"Peeta! Peeta! I'm here!"

I stare about me in confusion. Her voice has come from somewhere above me. I'm not sure how far down I came. I look around for the tall tree. I can feel the crackle of static in the air, realize it must be near midnight.

"I'm here! I'm here! Peeta!"

I turn and start heading back up the slope. My mind is torn in two directions. Surely, she won't be at the lightning tree, this close to midnight. But what if she is - injured and in need of help? I can't be sure; voices travel strangely in the jungle, but it seemed like her voice came from my left side, not my right. So I head straight up, slowing as I approach the crest of the hill.

When I reach it, I find that I'm much closer to the one o'clock tree than the twelve o'clock. Brutus and Chaff led me much further along the clock face than I realized. Katniss isn't there, which means….

 _Boom_!

"Katniss!" I cry out, desperate, face up to the sky.

This time, there is no answer. I run toward the twelve o'clock sector, keeping just down the slope so that I don't accidentally run into the force field. But I'm far too late. I can feel it again, the hairs on my neck standing straight up - and there's a flash of light, so bright that I don't see anything for a few seconds once it's over. Then there's a loud crash, and the ground below me rocks as if shaken with sudden violence. I fall on my back, sliding slightly downhill.

All around me, the trees begin to ignite with bright white flames and the ground begins to vomit up dirt and vines.


	26. Chapter 26

**Chapter Twenty-Six**

* * *

From my vantage point on the ground, I can see a patch of sky. It has lit up with thin streaks of electric blue lines, criss-crossing each other in a neat grid. The lines sputter and die out, and as they do, a dark, natural sky appears overhead. The moon is gone, but the stars are out, as bright and thick as a summer night in District 12. Then the sky reignites, but this time with bursts of fireworks, like multi-colored sparks.

What … happened?

"Katniss!"

But I can't even hear my own voice in the rushing sounds of the exploding trees. Would I have even heard a cannon in all this noise? Was Katniss in the twelve o'clock section when the lightning struck? What is going on?

I stagger to my feet and fight my way up the slope again, dodging the flaming particles of tree bark and leaves falling all around me. When I approach the crest, again slowing down before I come to the force field, I stop at a strange and confusing sight. Beyond the last ring of trees at the top of the hill, the arena has fallen away. Before me, as still as a painting, is a place far removed from the tropical humidity of the clock. I see a hard, flat plain, bare as a desert.

Panting, I grip a tree for balance. My mind is trying to make sense of it all, even while my gut tells me what has happened. The force field has failed with the last lightning strike. The world - the real world (but a strange, infertile, alien-looking place) - lies spread out before me, empty, unenclosed. I fight the sudden temptation to run out into it and see what is there.

A motion in the sky catches my eye and I look up to see a hovercraft, lifting up its claw from somewhere in the vicinity next to me, collecting the dead. No, no, no.

If she is dead, _if_ she is, I need to know. There's no more force field to run into, but I have my knife. And I would deserve the painful end, if I failed to keep her alive in this spectacular way. Beetee. Why did she trust him? Why?

I plunge onward. The noises are starting to fade - the fires dying out - the ground shivering now, not shuddering.

At the lightning tree, I see only Beetee, lying still as death, and Enobaria, lying down, also, with her lips trembling and her eyes wide open. I'm about to step into the charred clearing around the tree when the claw comes down and grabs Beetee, slowly pulling him up. I hang back, staring up as his body retreats up into the night. That's when I see the second hovercraft. This one pulses with a red light, and as the other craft pulls abruptly up, it shoots some sort of firebomb toward the first. The first one accelerates suddenly and flies away.

Still, nothing makes sense.

The remaining hovercraft lowers down, down, so low its wind fans the trees. When I understand that it is actually landing, not scooping in to pick up tributes, I make a break for it, running back down the slope, towards the lake. Hoping that if I go straight down, I will see that Katniss has fled there.

The beach is gone, swallowed by the lake. I stumble into the water before I have even cleared the trees. That's where they find me - the six Peacekeepers who pin me against the water before I can decide what to do.

We reach the lightning tree in time to see Enobaria carried out of the jungle and right into the hovercraft. While we wait, another group of Peacekeepers comes out of the jungle, with Johanna walking in front of them, at gunpoint, just like me. She gives me a quick, bitter glance. We're urged forward by the Peacekeepers, and Johanna scowls, "Don't touch me, I'm going."

We're marched out onto the plain. The night air here is hot and dry. The hovercraft opens and, once inside, we're led to the little room that the tribute and his or her stylist always sits in on the journey to the arena. Me, Johanna, and Enobaria - who is stretched out on the floor.

Johanna and I are urged to sit at the table, and then the door is closed and we can feel the hovercraft power up again and start to lift. I wonder who, besides Beetee, was on the other hovercraft? And also - why did this hovercraft attack it? I must have misinterpreted what happened, because it really doesn't make any sense.

"Johanna -." I start.

She glares at me. "You'd better get used to keeping your mouth shut, where we're going."

"About _what_?" I ask angrily. I look at her closely, and see the blood covering her hands. "What happened to Katniss? Were you attacked? Where did she go?"

"I don't know shit," she says. "And neither do you."

"Yes, I know - I really _don't_ know shit."

From the floor comes the sound of a low moaning. Enobaria tries to move, but she seems incapable of it.

"Be quiet, bitch," hisses Johanna. "If you so much as make a peep I will choke you dead. Fucking District 2."

A couple more times I try to engage Johanna in conversation, but she scowls and eventually just buries her face in her arms. I try to decide between shaking her until she speaks, bursting into tears or breaking out of this room. The only thing that keeps me glued to my seat is the hope that someone will tell me Katniss' fate when we get to the end of this ride. But whether it would be better for Katniss to be dead at this point, or imprisoned like me, I'm not sure.

Not dead. She isn't dead. She can't be dead. My mind will literally go if she is dead.

* * *

When we land in the Capitol and disembark, the first thing to greet me is the tinkling sound of the roof garden. We've landed on the Training Center roof. But - of course. This is where the Victors come at the end of the Games. But this time there are three of us - at least. I get a quick glimpse of the city lights surrounding us, and a taste of the cool light summer wind from the mountains - as if the last four days had never happened. Four days. Just four days ago, I had been here with Katniss.

Johanna and I are ushered into the elevator, where the sub-basement level is selected. That's when it starts.

"You going to strip for _us_ , darling?" one of the guards says to Johanna, grinning.

She spits in his face, and is thrown against the elevator wall, landing on the floor.

"Hey!" I yell, impulsively starting forward. That's when I'm punched in the face, and stagger backward myself.

"Everybody calm down!" one of the Peacekeepers yells. "You're rocking the car. There will be plenty of time for that once they're down below."

I rub my jaw.

"Probably shouldn't mess up that one's face," says another voice. "He'll probably be needed to be kept pretty for TV."

The sick laughter above us makes my head spin even harder.

The sub-basement is where the tributes are brought after the Games to be pieced back together again before being presented for public consumption. This is the place I woke up without my lower left leg, a year ago. We're led through interminable corridors and a long hallway until we come to a huge room, almost as large as the gym above us, but lined with a row of cells against one wall and large steel tables, sinks and counters on the other.

I'm shoved into one cell and Johanna into the one next to it. There is a low bed and a chamber pot. The cell is closed by a door of narrow steel bars. A camera is mounted to the high ceiling above me. Fuck.

"Johanna?" I say tremulously. "Are you OK?"

"Sure."

I look over at the tables and see beakers, needles lined up in glass cases on the wall. Sharp knives, forceps, cords and ropes. "What are they going to do with us? Where are we?"

"Hell," she says simply, her voice flat with despair.

 **The End**


End file.
